Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Just Dial Limited Q1 FY2023 earnings call. At this moment, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. At that time, you may click on the Raise Hand icon to ask a live question. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Abhishek Bansal, CFO, Just Dial Limited. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Hi, everyone. Welcome to Just Dial's earnings call for Q1 of fiscal 2023. Our operating revenue for the quarter stood at INR 185.6 crores, witnessing 11.4% sequential growth and 12.2% on a YOY basis. Our adjusted EBITDA, excluding ESOP expenses, stood at INR 11 crores versus a loss of INR 80 lakhs in previous quarter and a loss of INR 10.4 crores in June quarter last year. Our employee expenses have increased by approximately 33% on YOY basis, led by a 45% YOY increase in head count across sales, technology, content, marketing functions and increments in recent quarters. Our advertising expenses stood at about INR 6.5 crores for the quarter.
Other income stood at INR -60 crores during the quarter due to MTM loss on our INR 3,700 crore treasury portfolio, due to rise in bond yields during the quarter. Yields on two- to three-year triple-A bonds, which mostly reflects the underlying of our treasury, went up by 135-150 basis points on quarter-on-quarter basis during the quarter. On year-on-year basis, the same stood at about 205-220 basis points increase. With yields stabilizing, treasury income should return to normalcy and in any case, treasury yields should be looked at on a two- to three-year basis rather than quarterly basis since we typically hold our investments for three-year plus period to ensure they are tax efficient. Led by this MTM loss, we had a loss of INR 48.3 crores at net profit level.
Coming to business update, we continue to focus on selling on monthly payment plans. We signed up approximately 70% customers on monthly plans in last quarter. Our sales head count has gone up by about 53% on year-on-year basis. We have seen our monetization continuously improve significantly on month-on-month basis since last November, December, and the same has started showing up in top-line sequential growth as well. Our paid campaigns grew by approximately 22,000 count to total of about 484,000 active paid campaigns. Collections stood at about INR 201 crore during the quarter, witnessing 12.2% sequential growth. Deferred revenue stood at about INR 353.4 crore, which was up 4.5% sequentially and 15% year-on-year.
Sequential growth in deferred revenue despite focus on monthly payment plans, where upfront collections are typically lower is encouraging. The realizable value of sign-ups that we did in Q1 stood at about INR 235-240 crores. Realizable value is essentially total money that we expect to receive in one year from both upfront and monthly plans that is sold during the last quarter. This, as I mentioned, earlier, acts as a lead indicator for us to see where our collections and future PNL revenues are headed. Our monthly ECS collections, which is money received from direct bank debits for monthly plans, stood at about INR 33 crores for June month versus a low of just INR 13 crores in October 2021. The ramp-up in sales hiring is yielding good results, and we should see better monetization going forward.
Overall, as far as reported P&L is concerned, our sequential top line growth reflects improvement in monetization over last couple of quarters. Margins are currently suppressed because most employee costs hit our P&L immediately. As we see our top line ramp up in coming quarters, we should see margins improving as well. Cash and investments stood at INR 3,740 crores as on 30th June. Coming to operating highlights, traffic stood at about 148 million unique users for the quarter, growing 19% on a year-on-year basis. 84% of this traffic comes on mobile platforms. Total listings in database stands at now about 32.8 million.
In a nutshell, the core business is clearly on a recovery path and endeavor is to get it back to pre-COVID levels of top line and profitability as soon as possible and grow thereafter. Our new initiatives are getting rolled out to users in a phase-wise manner. Focus there is to get user experience right for these products and broadening coverage in terms of product services and geographies. With this update, we shall now open the floor for questions for further discussion. Thank you.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, please click on the Raise Hand icon available on the toolbar, or you may click on the Q&A icon to raise a hand. The operator will announce your name when it's your turn to ask the question. Please accept the prompt on your screen and unmute your microphone while proceeding with your question. We will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Vivekanand Subbaraman from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. Hello. Thank you very much for the opportunity. I have a few questions. Starting with the bookkeeping ones, could you give us a split of the campaigns and revenues by the top 11 cities and others? That's one. The other bookkeeping question is, the ESOP costs in the current quarter appear to be much lower than the run rate that we were seeing in the last Q7, Q8 . Any thoughts on how we should look at this number going ahead as well as advertising? Those are my bookkeeping ones. I want to ask a few others after this.
Sure. Vivek, firstly on campaigns and revenue distribution. Top 11 cities last quarter contributed about 43% to campaigns and about 64% to revenues. This particular distribution for last Q2- Q3 has largely been in this particular range. On ESOP expenses, yes, current quarter ESOP expenses are lower, primarily because the expenses that are getting recognized right now are from tranches that we had allocated almost two years ago. There haven't been any substantial ESOP fresh ESOP allocations in last one-two years. The way accounting works is that ESOP expenses tend to be front-ended.
For example, if there is a ESOP scheme which vests at 25% each year, the expense booking in first year is first 25% plus half of second 25%, plus one-third of third 25%, and so on. By the time you come to third or fourth year of ESOP expense recognition in P&L, they sort of taper down substantially. Going forward, basis whatever fresh ESOP allocations are done, these particular expenses will accordingly go up. On advertising spends, last quarter we spent about INR 6.5 crore. For the full year we have budgeted around 60 crore or so. As we get into future quarters, we could have certain branding, advertising. Digital will anyway continue. There could be quarters where it could be lumpy in nature.
Last quarter primarily was almost fully digital in nature.
Okay. This was very useful. Just a couple of additional questions. On the-
Sir, sorry to interrupt you. There is a slight disturbance coming from your line.
Is it better now? I'm closer to the mic.
Sir, I think it's the AV sound coming from your line.
Okay. Fine. I don't know if I'm audible or not, but, yeah.
No, it's okay. Please go ahead.
Yeah. The other question I had is with respect to your traffic and the content enrichment. It seems like you have added a lot of new listings in the current quarter, much more than what we have seen in the past. You know, if you can just give us some color on, you know, whether these new listings are helping you get any visibility on monetization. You know, is this part of your content enrichment strategy, or was it related to any sort of pent-up or catch-up as far as COVID is concerned? That's one. Second is on the A&P.
You said that most of the A&P was on digital, so I'm guessing that some of the traffic that you got in the previous quarter would include, you know, inorganic traffic also. Can you help us understand your traffic better and the trajectory? Thank you.
Firstly, on content enrichment. You are right, we added about 900,000 listings to our database. As I have mentioned in the past as well, see, India overall has about 70-80 million SMEs out there. We, despite being the largest local search engine, cover only say 40% of the population at this point of time. In last Q3-Q4 , the addition of fresh listings was relatively lower. There was more focus on enriching content in existing listings. Before that, if you would see, we were adding about 1 million listings every quarter for a good Q8-Q10 . This particular quarter, again, we have focused on broadening our coverage.
Once we add listings, obviously those particular listings start getting prospected by our sales team and over time that aids monetization as well. It is difficult to say whether listings that got added this particular quarter are directly aiding monetization. To your other question on advertising spends. Yes, there was some particular paid traffic that came during this particular quarter. Out of about 145 million users, approximately, I think around 15% also would be from paid means, and rest is coming organically.
Great. Thank you. I'll come back if necessary.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Pranav Kshatriya from Edelweiss. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, thanks for the opportunity. My first question is, you know, we've seen a very strong employee addition in this quarter. If I look at the revenue productivity or the collection productivity, it seems to be, you know, significantly lower than what we had pre-COVID level. Should we expect that pre-COVID level productivity to be achieved in next Q2 to Q3 or it could take longer and we should assume a, you know, lower productivity of this workforce?
Okay, Pranav. First of all, we need to understand on which particular metric are we measuring productivity. The two metrics that you mentioned, revenue and collection. Firstly, coming to revenues of INR 185 crore. One eighty-five crore revenue is getting recognized in P&L from customers whom I had sold in last Q3-Q4 , when my sales strength was not that higher. As a result, this particular revenue divided by number of employees will not be the right indicator because this particular revenue is not really the revenue achieved by current sales force. Second, as far as collections are concerned, collections of INR 200 crore, while they are better than revenues, they are relatively lower currently because a lot of customers are getting signed up on monthly payment plans, where upfront collections is lower.
The realistic metric which we look at it is, as I mentioned, the realizable value, which is the expected revenue that I expect to get from sign-ups that I did in this particular quarter, which stood at about INR 235 crore-INR 240 crore. That particular INR 235 crore is what I will likely get over next one year from sales done by my existing sales force in last Q1 . That will be a more relevant metric. Considering we had about, I think, 10,000 odd employees at our peak pre-COVID, and now we have about 10,600-something in sales. Productivity is likely still lower, but considering additions have happened in last three-four months, in next two-three months, these particular employees will likely start getting us even better productivity.
For example, against INR 235 crores of realizable value for the quarter, my exit run rate was about 250+. That way we are on a month-on-month improving trajectory.
Sure. If I look at, you know, the contribution of the monthly payment plan to the revenue, how much will that be?
Contribution to revenue.
70% is the number of customer, right?
70% of customers that I signed up in this particular quarter came on monthly payment plans. If I were to look at, distribution of my overall active campaigns of 485,000, there are approximately 40% are on monthly plans and 60% on upfront plans. As we keep going into future quarters, that 40% will keep moving up. That 40% was 32% in March quarter, at March quarter end.
Sure. Do you see any challenges in reaching to the pre-COVID margin? I mean, you know, we were consistently 25% ±2% kind of range. Is that margin possible in next few quarters or there are certain headwinds to it?
Definitely once we reach that kind of pre-COVID top line, I think, we should be reaching those kind of margin levels. Currently margins are lower because there is a sort of mismatch between revenue recognition and the salary expenses. I think once we reach that INR 230 crore-INR 240 crore range, whatever incremental revenues will come in from current levels versus that pre-COVID levels, a good chunk of that should directly flow to EBITDA.
Okay. Should we assume the salary levels, you know, to be higher than what pre-COVID level was or you know, we can actually go to that level?
Yes, it's salary levels would be definitely higher. Couple of reasons. One, basis regular increments it's over last two years salary levels have gone up. Second, every state keeps coming up with revised wage levels for either minimum wages or other statutory compliances. Basis that there is obviously an increase in wage levels versus pre-COVID.
Okay. Last question from my side. Any comment on, you know, regarding the synergies with the parent and how you are working together, you know, to build any business or, you know, anything which you can tell us?
As far as synergies with RRVL are concerned, we currently are sort of looking at our business in two buckets. One is the core search business, where the endeavor is to get it back to pre-COVID levels of, for top line and profitability ASAP. There's a clear visibility on the same already. Then the second bucket is to add a transactional layer on the local search platform that we have. On the second side, where there is good expertise of RRVL as well, we are working closely with them. One of the products which is a hyperlocal marketplace, we have already rolled out a pilot for users in three cities, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, for certain categories such as electronics, mobiles, et cetera.
We are working very closely with them on those particular projects.
Okay. Do you think that ONDC can be an enabler or a, you know, challenge for you in any way?
Once that particular ONDC gets implemented, we'll have to see. Since we are just rolling out these transactional services, we'll have to see how it pans out.
That's it from my side. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Ankur Jain, individual investor. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, good evening, everyone. Thanks for the opportunity. I have two questions. One, even before Reliance Retail Ventures, Reliance Retail came into the picture in Just Dial. You know, I've been an investor into Just Dial based on what I was hearing about JD Mart and, you know, the B2B transactions thing. I think you just explained that you also look at your business in two buckets. You look at the search, the traditional business, and then the value that you try to derive from those clients that you get through search in your B2B business or something.
You know, it's been at least Q7 , if not more, and you've had pilots in three cities you mentioned. It is highly disappointing to know that your investor deck contains no information at all on any of such disclosures on the two segments.
Ideally, you are actually looking at two segments. Even as per the accounting standards, you have to be reporting about those two segments. I mean, you may choose to say that, "No, we don't," but internally you're very well aware that you have to, but you don't. I would like to pick your thoughts on that. Because as an individual investor, I find it disheartening. I put in my valuable money into it, a lot of money based on a story, but I don't get to hear an update on that story. That story is behind closed doors. Obviously, not everything can be open, but there is some responsibility that the business has towards the minority shareholders. That's one. Number two, if I heard correctly, you said your mark-to-market loss is about INR 48 Cr, if I heard correctly.
Also your loss for the quarter is about INR 48 crore. If both the numbers are the same, are we saying that we actually did not make any money in this quarter? This was just a breakeven quarter. These are the two questions I have. Thank you.
Hi, Ankur. Quick clarification on the second point first. Mark-to-market loss during the quarter was about INR 60 crore and INR 48 crore was loss at PAT level.
Great.
Excluding other income, the overall profit was about INR 12 and a half crores.
Sorry to interrupt you, but even the mark-to-market-
Yeah, yeah.
Would be adjusted for tax, no? That's what I thought.
Mark-to-market would be adjusted for tax, but that tax essentially would be reversal of past gains that we would have recognized.
Right. Absolutely. It will be closer to 48 if I look at it, maybe 20, 25% tax rate. Anyway, I leave that gap.
Right. Coming to your first question on regarding looking at the business in two buckets and relevant disclosures for the same. Firstly, see, JD Mart, the monetization model is subscription-based listings itself. At this point of time, out of the total unique users that we had for last quarter, about 8%-9% of those particular users came for JD Mart related new pages. Why I'm referring to new pages because as part of JD Mart, what we have done is we have essentially brought products on our platform, those listings we already had. Earlier, about 22% of our revenues used to come from B2B related categories. At this point of time, for last quarter, that number stood at about 25.5%-26%.
On JD Mart, the dedicated team which works on monetization for the same is now about 600, 650 people, which previous quarter was about 400 people. Considering JD Mart's particular monetization works as a listing fee itself, and JD Mart products are available on both JD and JD Mart platforms, that obviously gets recognized as overall revenue. The key is that this particular platform's monetization should aid us with revenue growth, which is happening at this point of time, as can be seen with the sequential growth. As far as the
Yeah.
transaction business
I'm more worried about the disclosure about it. If you see, your stock has taken a beating of more than 50% from its peak. Well, in this scenario, every stock has taken a beating, but some have taken more than the others, and you obviously belong to the more category. There needs to be some introspection and some responsibility shown towards the investors who are not sitting in the board room discussing some secretive things. There is so much cash in the balance sheet, and for Q8 we're hearing the same story. Obviously there needs to be something shared with us.
You are right. Please understand that as management, we obviously cannot simply control what happens to our stock prices. Yes, operating performance is fully in our hands, which is what we are working on. I think if we continue to deliver numbers both on top-line profitability as well as new initiatives, this particular current gap should ideally get bridged in coming quarters. As far as disclosures et cetera are concerned, feedback taken. Whatever is relevant which we should disclose, we will continue to do so.
Yeah. Correct, you cannot control the price, but maybe the introspection means that because of your silence, your complete secrecy, if I may use that word, the stock has taken a beating and people are not believing the story any longer. That's what I meant. Obviously, I'm not asking you to control the price, which you cannot, obviously. Fair enough. You know, that's all I have.
Sure.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Naman Jain, individual investor. Please go ahead. Naman Jain-
Hello. Am I audible?
Yes, now you are.
Yeah, Abhishek, I just wanted to ask a small question as to I saw the pilot launch of JD Shopping, right? Saw that there are three categories broadly where you guys have launched products, mobiles, electronics, and home and kitchen products. What are the initial feedbacks, and what is the plan to scale it up? How long are we gonna take?
Naman, on JD Shopping, as you rightly said, three particular categories have been launched. At this point of time, vendors are being onboarded in each of these categories. The key USP that we are working right now is that, four-hour delivery and basis whatever pilot orders we have been receiving. In almost 90%-99% of the cases, we are able to achieve the same. Over next Q2-Q3 , endeavor is to broaden product selection across other categories and also onboard vendors in other cities as well. We are already in the process of adding 3 more cities and on a month-on-month basis, so sometime by the end of this particular fiscal year, the product catalog selection and number of cities should be meaningful.
The target is to cover almost all metros by then.
Okay. In the last call, we discussed about, you know, are we going to give discounts from the cash that we have? It was clearly mentioned that, you know, we are not in the business of attracting a customer by giving discounts. Now in these three categories, I can see there are some discounts offered. Just a clarification, are these from the merchant end or is this our company giving discount on the products?
Whatever discounts that you see in the platform are solely from the merchant end. While we have an advertising budget, these days the way you look at advertising is a customer acquisition cost. In case we think that for certain categories where we have decent margin, we can afford to pass on a part of that margin back to consumers, we would look to do so. The discounts that you see currently at this point of time are fully borne by merchants.
Okay. In that case, again, two things then. One is that you have, you know, allotted a large advertising budget in this year. Are we going to do TV commercials for JD Shopping specifically? Because I understand the core business anyway is doing very well, and we are getting back on track. Since this is a new launch, are we planning to do majority of our spending on this, advertising spending?
Advertising budget that I mentioned, majority of that is planned for core business itself.
Okay.
For JD Shopping, the thought process is unless there is a substantial pan-India coverage and cross-category coverage, we would mainly focus on digital advertising, because via digital you can target specific categories, specific geographies. Once we have desired user experience in place, etc., then obviously ATL campaigns will follow.
Okay. What is the targeted or a vision to how much transactions per month do you want to reach in JD Shopping? As in some vision that may help us understand the prospect of the opportunity.
See, this particular segment per se has a huge opportunity in terms of there is no pure play 3P marketplace currently. All SMEs dealing in products want online presence to get new customers, etc. I wouldn't put specific numbers in terms of what the ambitions are. I think on a month-on-month basis, we want to see that we keep improving both the user experience side, fulfillment side, and then over the next few quarters, we will see how numbers, etc., pan out.
Okay. Just one more thing on this. What is going to be the plan to monetize this? Basically, is this going to be commission-based on each product that we are going to make money, or is it going to be a subscription-based model? Because from other competitors, I understand it is more of a commission-based business.
At this point of time, we are signing up merchants on a commission-based model itself. Once we have substantial traffic, then other streams of revenue such as advertising, et cetera, too can form part of revenues in this particular vertical as well.
Okay. It is not going to be like our core business where we have a monthly plan or something like that. It's not going to be the same for daily shopping, is it?
No, this will be pure like commission on every transaction.
Order. Okay. Okay.
Yeah.
Just one small question on the cash balance that we have. What are we planning to do with that? Because obviously it's a large balance that we have. Any plans to distribute it or use it for buyback or something?
No such plans at this point of time. We have exciting products in pipeline we would want to spend on building those particular products, content enrichment, advertising those particular products in future. The good part is we have a core business in place, which is a healthy free cash flow generating business. We'll see after maybe 12-18 months how the situation is. At this point of time, we think our core business itself should be able to fund a good chunk of these particular new initiatives.
Initiatives. Yeah. Which is why I'm asking you the question. If your core business is able to support all these initiatives, why not, why, you know, deploy cash at such lower returns? Why not pass it on to investors or, you know, do something better of it?
Some of the new projects that we have undertaken tend to be long gestation projects. There could be a situation where we think that an aggressive advertising plan could help us scale exponentially. We want to be in a situation that we can comfortably take those decisions with the cash on our balances.
Okay. Just one small feedback. I think it is also got to do with the previous participant who had asked the question. I think what is needed from the company is like you did your pilot launch in three cities. If there could be some small press release or something to at least keep the investors updated. Because even I had asked in the last call when is the launch going to happen, and then you had mentioned in the H1 , so the end of the Q1 or maybe the beginning of the Q2 . It did happen then, but I had to go to the app and check whether it has been done.
A small press release of, you know, the updates that are happening in the company would really help keep, you know, information flow regularly with investors.
Sure. Definitely, we'll do so. In this particular case, simply the thought process was that, we launched this particular product with a few sort of vendors onboarded. We are, you know, on a day-to-day basis onboarding more vendors and expanding the catalog. The thought process was once we reach a certain critical mass such that people are able to search for products in their relevant settings, it would be more prudent at that particular point of time to put out a public disclosure.
Okay. Just one small clarification. I tried ordering some products from JD Shopping, but a hyperlocal really I thought was that it should get delivered in about three to four hours. But, to me on the app it showed, it will be delivered, by 3 P.M. and on the next day. It's not really hyperlocal in that sense, right?
Okay. Currently in these particular three cities, there are certain PIN codes where we are able to achieve that particular four-hour timeframe. There are other PIN codes where we are still onboarding vendors. Once we have vendors in each particular category in each particular PIN code, ultimately we'll have that three to four-hour delivery in each PIN code. The incident that you mentioned is the exact reason that we have not been putting out a public disclosure saying that this is live. While the platform is live to gather feedback from users who are using it, at the same time, there is content expansion that is underway.
Okay. Point taken. Wish you all the very best for the future quarters. Hope we see the operating revenue improving with the bottom line.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Vivekanand Subbaraman from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you again for the follow-up. Abhishek, can you give us some color on the cash operating costs that you foresee, the inflation that you foresee in fiscal 2023 and 2024 for the cash operating costs? Secondly, could you comment on the operating margins of the company if you hadn't been investing in these multiple new initiatives? Broad sense is good enough. Thank you.
Firstly, on cash operating costs, escalation in FY 2023, 2024, difficult to say. Having said that, I think on the employee expenses, clearly with overall inflation being quite high, 7%-8% on an overall basis, definitely needs to be rolled out. Similar could be for other expenses. On your second query regarding these new initiatives. New initiatives, about INR 12-13 crores of spends are actually capitalized as assets under development. Since these particular products are still in the building stage, these particular costs won't hit our PNL at this point of time.
That's useful. Could you also comment on what portion of the new initiatives and investments are hitting the PNL or is it entirely going into the assets under development?
Entirely, it's under development for new transaction-related initiatives.
JD Mart costs are in the PNL, right?
Yeah. They are already in the P&L. Yes, they are completely in P&L simply because their revenue model is listing fee and the product had been obviously launched long time back.
Just to recount the new initiatives apart from JD Mart, which is already hitting the P&L because you have launched the product. JD Shopping, JD Xperts, and I believe there were some products on the real estate side, right? Am I missing something?
Yeah, primarily these particular products, JD Shopping, Jd Xperts. Basically product related transactions form part of shopping. Services related transactions form part of experts.
Oh, okay. Understood. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Vijit Jain from Citi. Please go ahead. Vijit, may I request you unmute your microphone from your side, please. Vijit, may I request, unmute your line, please. Due to no response, we move on to the next participant. Next question is from the line of Anmol Garg from DAM Capital. Please go ahead.
Hey. Hi, Abhishek. Abhishek, just had few questions. Firstly, if you can split the advertisement cost during the quarter between the paid campaign and the brand related advertisements, that would be great.
Out of the INR 6.5 crores that we spent, almost about INR 5.5-INR 6 crores went as part of digital initiatives.
Sure. Secondly, if you can also, I mean, give your views that if you are planning to do any acquisition related to in the JD Mart space particularly to acquire more customers or to have more value-added services?
No, there aren't any such thoughts on acquisition as of now.
Sure. Thirdly, just wanted to ask that largely what will be the average realization of JD Mart right now and how many will be the paid suppliers in the category? In continuation with the same, has there been any increase in the customer acquisition cost from right now as compared to a year back? Yeah, that's it from my end.
Average realization for JD Mart or B2B related campaigns would broadly be in the range of about INR 20,000 per campaign on an annual basis. Regarding your question around customer acquisition costs. Customer acquisition costs currently would be bit higher versus what it was last year due to higher salary levels. As and when the current batch of sales team achieves desired productivity, once they get tenured, I think our particular cost of sales will be at par with what it was one or two years ago.
Sure. If you can also give the paid supplier numbers in JD Mart.
Paid suppliers there broadly would be closer to about, I think, 100,000 or so.
Sure. Thanks, Abhishek. That's it from me.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Abhishek Banerjee from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Hello. Am I audible?
Yes, now you're audible.
Yes. Hi, Abhishek. Thanks for the presentation. I'm relatively new to the company, so might have a few basic questions. First of all, I want to start with the ad spends part. What did you say you had budgeted for the full year? I missed that number.
About INR 60 crores.
Okay. INR 60 crore is full year, and this would include your digital initiatives, which is, you know, giving some offers on your daily shopping platform.
No. This particular INR 60 crore does not include any customer acquisition cost or advertising spends for new initiatives. This INR 60 crore we have at this point of time earmarked for core business itself.
Okay. Got it. Thanks. Now moving to what you spoke about monthly subscription plan. Could you please explain what is the rationale for it? I mean, did you see any liquidity concerns with your supplier base?
Abhishek, what typically happens is, Just Dial sells its listings in two payment plans. Either you could pay upfront or monthly payment plan. For example, you could either pay a INR 4,000 down payment and sign a mandate which allows us to charge you INR 2,000 per month on your bank account. Or you could directly pay a, say, annual subscription of INR 22,000. Now, post-COVID or during COVID, what has happened is some of the customers might be averse to actually shelling out the entire INR 22,000 upfront. We thought that, okay, for us it is important to sign up customers. Once they sign up, once they taste the services, definitely they would be willing to stick around for a longer period of time.
Plus, the ecosystem is also evolving in a manner that everything is being sold on EMI plans, monthly installment plans. That is what has made us gravitate towards monthly plans, and which so far is working out pretty well.
No, absolutely understand. You're basically saying that for a person who is going with a monthly plan, they are actually paying INR 22,000 to you in a year. That's around. Yeah. Sorry.
Over time, over a period of nine-10 months, they would end up paying that particular amount.
Got it. What is the retention level? I mean, for a customer who's going with the monthly plan, what is the average realization you're getting from them in a year?
Average realization that we get from our monthly customer is very similar to what we would get from upfront customers. Last quarter, whatever we sold on monthly plans, approximately 20,000, 19.5, 20,000 annually is likely to be the annual realization. What happens is in a monthly plan, my ticket size tends to be slightly higher. Upfront plan might be, say, INR 21,000-22,000 for the year. In a monthly payment plan, I am able to get them to sign up at INR 2,000 a month, which effectively is INR 24,000 for the year. Even if the customer does not honor full payment or honors for, say, nine-10 months, I still end up getting INR 20,000-21,000.
Got it. I mean, with the time value of money, what does that come to? Is it coming a little lower?
Not really. In fact, in this particular case, whatever are our particular monthly plans, they tend to be perpetual in nature. They get auto-renewed at the end of each year. Even today we have certain customers who signed up on monthly payment plans five years, seven years ago. In fact, there is zero cost of sales in those particular plans. That time value of money relatively is not a factor, a significant factor in this.
Got it. Okay. Coming from slightly different angle. What was the annual, you know, planned cost, say, a couple of years back? Has that increased over years?
Annual? Sorry.
The annual subscription cost that we were talking about, what has been the inflation in that over the last three-four years?
During COVID times, we had actually rolled out certain discounts to customers. The first thing that we did in the month of October, November was withdraw all those particular discounts. Our pricing varies by geography, pricing varies by category. pre-COVID, if you see our realizations used to be at the peak was about INR 18,000 per campaign annually. right now, while the P&L realization would be lower because P&L revenues, as I mentioned, are lower. The realization that I am getting from customers that I'm signing up right now is ballpark in the range of about INR 19,500-INR 20,000. there has been about 8%-10% increase versus my pre-COVID peak levels.
Oh, that's really good to mention. See, the reason why I was asking this is that while on a yearly basis when you're asked to make a payment, it's actually easier to pass on inflation whereas if you're doing it on a monthly basis because, as you're saying, if there's an auto debit, right? If you need to increase that INR 2,000 to INR 2,500, that would require a customer approval, I'm guessing, which might be a little bit of a friction, which is what I was trying to understand there.
There also it is not necessary that you need a customer approval in the sense that, yes, you need a customer approval, but if the limit on the previous mandate is higher. For example, versus a INR 2,000 per month plan, if the limit set is INR 3,000 per month, you can actually bill post customer consent for a higher value. Right now also there are 30% customers that come on upfront payment plans. Monthly payment plans are lucrative to get a new customer into the ecosystem, and thereafter, once customers are satisfied with the services, want to take up higher value plans.
Okay.
A good chunk of them want to opt for upfront plans. Their renewals obviously happen with a inflation built in.
Got it. Understood. Very clear. Is there any way of passing on this thing to NBFC perhaps? I mean, taking a loan out in that sense, can it facilitate that or have you done that in any way?
We provide various payment modes. For example, a payment mode is EMI on your credit card, EMI on your debit card. In fact, those plans work in a manner that customer has to pay on a monthly basis to their respective bank or credit card, whereas we get the money upfront. In fact, we incentivize by bearing that particular interest component. We tell the customer that you will anyway pay 2,000 INR per month on your credit card. You don't have to pay any extra interest. As Just Dial, the benefit we get is we get the entire, whatever, 22,000 INR, 24,000 INR less whatever is the interest upfront.
Mm-hmm.
All those particular payment plans are being made available to our customers.
That is accounted for in the 70% or it's in the 30%?
I count it in 30% because I got the money upfront.
Understood. Okay, sir. That was very helpful. Now, moving to the new initiatives, will it be possible for you to share any of the take rates for JD Shopping and Jd Xperts?
JD Shopping, take rates broadly should be, like I said, they vary by category, but overall should be in the range of, I think, 7%-8%, depending on-
Mm-hmm.
Certain categories, such as mobile phones, could be lower, whereas categories such as apparel, etc., would be higher. In case, in future, unbranded products come in, there obviously take rates would be higher. On the services side, it is typically in the range of around 20% or so.
Got it. In terms of services that you are providing, what are the touch points that you're interacting with the customer, right? What are the touch points or what are the services that you are helping your suppliers with?
While the vendors are onboarded, they are given proper kits, etc. at the time of onboarding. We have also started some bit of training also for these particular vendors. They go through complete SOPs that they need to follow while fulfilling orders that are passed to them. As far as the user is concerned, we keep them completely aware of when is the vendor likely to arrive. In case of any delays or any rescheduling, etc., there are particular alerts that automatically gets done via the app or there is a team that proactively reaches out and does that.
Whatever a user and a vendor need to do or need to be assisted in order to fulfill that particular transaction, either that is done in an automated manner via the platform, or if the automated stuff is not able to assist them, then there is a manual intervention that takes place.
Okay. This you are obviously telling me about JD Services, right?
Yes.
Say vis-à-vis somebody like an Urban Company, correct? I mean, what proportion of the services that an Urban Company gives would you be offering? That can actually be 70%, 80% of that.
Proportion in terms of number of services or how?
No. I'm talking about, say, if I want a plumber, right?
Mm-hmm.
If I am, say, ordering on Urban Company vis-à-vis if I'm ordering on Jd Xperts, will the services of Urban Company be more than what you are giving or same?
In my assessment, the services would be almost the same because there is a standardized tariff card for each particular service. You will be, as a user, informed beforehand which particular provider will come to fulfill that particular transaction.
Mm-hmm.
You will have similar options for payment.
Mm-hmm.
The key lies in what are the value-add services that we can provide. Mainly the idea is that earlier users were calling up these particular professionals, then negotiating, a tariff or a rate at their particular doorstep. Now everything is done by a click of a button with pre-information to both the user and the vendor, how much needs to be charged. Once the transaction is concluded, user can pay via cash on the spot or pay online, and all those particular features are in place.
Got it. How many services do you have on JD Xperts right now?
Currently eight categories are live.
How many do you foresee in the near term?
8 would probably go to around, I think, 10-12 categories. We'll keep taking a look, basis. The idea will be to sort of master the existing set of categories first.
Got it. This is my last question on JD Shopping. You've mentioned 78% take rate. For that, do you help in order fulfillment in any way?
We have tied up with the third-party logistics service providers. Essentially, we are a marketplace where vendors are listed. The logistics is also third-party. This particular platform connects those particular users with the sellers. User places an order, seller is informed, seller keeps the product ready. The third-party logistics provider goes and picks up the product and delivers it to the user.
Okay. The money is held in an escrow account and after
Yes. Money is held in an escrow account, and once the timeline for returns or refunds are over, then it is released to the merchant.
Got it. You have no
Mr. Manji, sorry to interrupt you.
No, I'm so sorry. I think, yeah. Yeah. That's fine. That's fine. Thank you so much for your time, Abhishek. Really appreciate it.
Thank you so much, sir. The next question is from the line of Arjun Ashar, Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
I wanted to ask, how long will you be in the content enrichment space?
The line for the participant dropped. We move to the next participant. The next question is from the line of Swapnil from JM Financial. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks for the opportunity. Abhishek, I just wanted to understand your strategy change. Last year, same period, I think, we had spent a lot in doing the IPL to promote our B2B JD Mart business. This year, we have added, you know, the last Q2, Q3 we have significantly ramped up our sales team. I think, based on the numbers that you shared, you have been able to, you have seen significant traction in your JD Mart business, or the B2B side of it. Will that be fair to say, that your sales team is more, you've been able to deliver better results compared to the advertising spends that we did last year?
Swapnil, the advertising spend that we did, almost at the same time we got hit with the second wave of COVID, which further impacted SMEs across B2C, B2B segments. Last two to Q3 , we have spent time in terms of, fine-tuning our pricing or sort of, withdrawing all sorts of discounts, ramping up our sales force. Both B2C and B2B are coming back on track. With the increasing proportion of B2B and dedicated focus via 600+ B2B monetization team, definitely these particular categories are giving better revenues.
Okay. Secondly, question. We used to have around 535,000 campaigns pre-COVID. That dropped to around 430,000 sometime Q2 last year. Out of this mortality that we are seeing roughly under 1,000 odd, how much have we been able to recover back or how much is pending? Can you give something from that?
Currently we are at about 485,000 campaigns. Half of the drop is sort of covered. Endeavor is that we should exit the year at our closer to our peak campaign counts. Last quarter we have added about 45,000 campaigns.
Actually, my question was from the perspective like of the 100 odd thousand that went out of the system, right? How many are part of that 45,000 that you added in the last Q2 ? What is the potential, you know, recovery that we can think about, beyond the new additions that you might have seen?
See, we are dealing with the small and medium businesses, where what happens is a particular business might be, or a particular person might be doing a certain XYZ business, two years ago. Later, they might be doing some other business, and they might be advertising with us, at both time periods. Or it is not possible for to look at it as, that 100,000 which actually went out or did not renew, how many of them have come back. In any case, in case of Just Dial, even if a customer has not renewed, be it pre-COVID period or current period, whatever it is, it does not mean that the customer has gone away forever.
The way Just Dial has an advertising budget, for example, FY 2019 we spent about INR 65 crore. Next year, COVID year, we spent only INR 6.5 crore. Again, we spent about INR 65 crore last year. That will be a sort of similar behavior for SMEs also. Whenever they are comfortable to advertise for their particular business, they would come and see whichever platforms they want to advertise. There could be periods where they may not want to do so. The way we evaluate is what is the total current number of active campaigns that we have.
Okay. Given that we did 22,000 additions this quarter, do you think we will be able to sustain such additions in the forthcoming quarters also? Typically, if I go historically, one good quarter is followed by some subdued numbers in the following quarters, but it's been two consecutive strong quarters that we have had. How do we think about the forthcoming quarters?
As I said that the last particular quarter considering exit run rate was better versus full quarter. That sort of gives us assurance that some of these particular trends should keep improving on a month-on-month basis. If we are thinking that we want to exit the year at peak campaign run rate, then definitely a healthy quarter-on-quarter campaign addition is what we ideally foresee.
All right. Just the last question. You mentioned INR 60 crore of budget for our core, you know, core business A&P. How can we think about the non-core business investments that you're thinking about? Like, how much should we factor in or any sense of guidance on that?
I think we are still working out that once these particular products are in a decent stage to be advertised both on digital and subsequently ATL. I think we will have to wait for another probably a quarter or so before we can sort of have some clarity on how much spends we are likely to do on those initiatives.
Okay, cool. Thanks a lot for taking the questions.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Nayan Thakkar from Ashika Group. Please go ahead.
Hello. Hello.
Go ahead, sir. You're audible.
Yeah. Thank you, sir, for taking my question. Sir, I would like to have some clarification on the plan of parent entity with respect to JD's platform, whether the JD platform will be integrated to the JioMart or any other application of parent entity.
Nayan, yes, there can definitely be synergies or integrations. We are sort of in touch with them. For example, on our particular platform, we have already integrated access for Jio SIM card. Similarly, Just Dial apps could get integrated with MyJio application, which already has access to multiple other RIL group applications. Some of those particular integrations are already being discussed.
Sure, sir. Thank you. Sir, you were just explaining to us with respect to the logistics, third-party delivery partners. Can we understand, is it like the RIL's logistics company is being used by the Just Dial for providing the services?
No, these are completely whatever third-party services such as Dunzo, Grab, Shipyaari and whatever other logistics service providers that are out there who do e-commerce fulfillments for various companies.
Okay. Sure, sir. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll take the last question from the line of Arjun Ashar, individual investor. Please go ahead.
If I'm audible now, I wanted to know how long will we be in the pilot phase for the first three cities for JD Shopping and JD Xperts in terms of content and enrichment so that we have gone wide as well as deep in various categories of content being listed on the website, on the app.
In terms of JD Shopping, that went live for users just about, I think, one month ago, and we are already in the process of adding more cities. Current quarter it would get added. As far as Jd Xperts is concerned, current set of services are already live in about 10-11 cities.
No, I'll just illustrate. For instance, I visit a store like Benzer or Amarsons from JD Shopping. I see only a few categories. Like in Benzer, you just had shopping bags, you know, whereas it's an entire super store. Or if I look up any local hardware store, when do I reach a stage where I can find at least 100 to 150 SKUs of that hardware stores listed on JD Shopping? When do we reach that phase?
I think it will take around six-nine months for us to reach that particular stage where there is a reasonably broad selection of products available across all major PIN codes and top metros.
What will be our strategy to funnel users to these, you know, listings? Because right now there is no awareness. You know, if I want to buy, say, a door knob, many don't know that there is an option like that. Then what happens is that our customers also don't have an incentive to load their entire catalog of inventory on JD Shopping. You know, it becomes a chicken and egg kind of situation. What is our strategy to attract users to the website and app?
Couple of things. One, these particular products and these particular vendors will have access via our particular homepage on existing platforms. From the shop online section, users can explore these particular products. Second, there is already a traffic that comes organically searching for these particular listings. Once users come for these particular listings, they get to see that, okay, there are transactions or shopping enabled. Third, there will be dedicated apps also for these particular initiatives. Once we start advertising, that is how users will basically get to know that more users will get to know that these particular optionalities exist, and that is how product will get scaled up.
Okay. The advertising will be like national campaign, so there will be, again, hyperlocal, advertising campaigns like, in-store fronts and all that. Like how Paytm used to have these stickers on every cashier's desk and.
In the first phase, it will be digital in nature because that will help us to target certain geographies, certain categories of products. Once we have a decent selection and more geographies covered, then it will be a ATL campaign. Thereafter, then it can be a mix of hyperlocal marketing. I mean, there will be annual budget, part of which will go towards branding advertising, and a part of it will go towards digital, other sorts of hyperlocal advertising.
Sure. All the best for future.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question. I will now hand the conference over to Mr. Abhishek Bansal for closing comments.
Thank you everyone for joining us. In case you have any further queries, please do reach out. We will do our best to address. That's it from our side. Thank you.
Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Just Dial Limited, that concludes today's session. Thank you for your participation. You may now click on the Exit Meeting to disconnect. Thank you.