Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Matrimony.com Q3 FY 2022 earnings conference call hosted by Antique Stock Broking. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity to ask questions later during the conference. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing Star and then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note, this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Prateek Kumar from Antique Stock Broking. Please go ahead, sir.
Thanks, Chris, and good afternoon, everyone. Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy. On behalf of Antique Stock Broking, we welcome today the management of Matrimony.com, Mr. Murugavel Janakiraman, Chairman and Managing Director, and Mr. Sushanth Pai, who is CFO. Without wasting much time, I hand over the call to Mr. Murugavel Janakiraman for his opening remarks, and then we will move to Q&A session. Over to you, sir.
Thank you so much. Good evening, everyone. I hope all of you are continuing to stay safe and healthy. I'd also like to wish you a very happy and successful 2022. In a better seasonal quarter, we have reported a reasonably good growth year-on-year on billing and a double-digit year-on-year growth in revenues. This was due to strong execution of strategic priorities backed up by investment in the right areas. In quarter three on a consolidated basis, we have achieved a billing of INR 107.4 crores, a growth of 0.5% quarter-over-quarter and a 7.3% year-on-year. Revenue was at INR 108.5 crores, a decline of 1.3% quarter-over-quarter and a growth of 12.2% year-on-year. For matchmaking, the key highlights are as follows.
In quarter three, the billing was at INR 106.1 crores, a flat quarter-over-quarter and a growth of 6.3% year-on-year. Revenue at INR 107.2 crores, a decline of 1.8% quarter-over-quarter and a growth of 11.4% year-on-year. We added 2.15 lakh paid subscriptions during the quarter, a decline of 5.4% year-on-year. ATV, Average Transaction Value, for the matchmaking business increased by 12.2% year-on-year, and also due to this is due to good growth in our premium services. We continue to track the impact we create for our customers. We are happy to state that we have created 25,500+ success stories in quarter three.
Now, coming to the marriage services business, our revenue was INR 1.3 crore, a growth of 6.8% quarter-over-quarter and 194.4% year-on-year. This includes the consolidation of ShaadiSaga for a full quarter. Losses for the quarter was INR 2.86 crore against INR 1.5 crore in quarter two. This was due to consolidations, the cost will increase. On the billing and revenue outlook for quarter four, matchmaking billing we expect to bounce back to a double-digit growth, both the quarter-over-quarter and also year-on-year basis. Wedding services expect to continue the current revenue momentum and losses will be in the similar range of quarter three. Let me now pass on to Sushanth to comment on the key profitability highlights. Sushanth, over to you.
Thanks, Murugavel Janakiraman. Let me also wish a very happy and successful 2022. Due to subdued billings in September and October in matchmaking business, our revenue declined marginally on a quarter-on-quarter basis. Therefore, this had an impact on EBITDA margins. Our EBITDA margin in quarter three was at 24.5% as compared to 29% in quarter two, however, was better than 23.6% a year ago. Marketing expenses are at INR 41.6 crores as compared to INR 39.9 crores in quarter two. Excluding marketing expenses, our margins in matchmaking are at 63% in quarter three as compared to 66% in quarter two and 63% a year ago. The margins declined due to increase in employee costs and technology expenses.
On a consolidated basis, our EBITDA margins in Q3 are at 18.6% as compared to 24% in quarter two and 19.1% a year ago. Apart from matchmaking, marriage services have an increase in employee costs due to ShaadiSaga consolidation. On an absolute basis, EBITDA declined by 23.6% quarter-on-quarter and grew 8.9% year-on-year. Tax rate is at 25.3% for the quarter. PAT, profit after tax, excluding Astro, which is our associate company, is at INR 11.6 crores, a decline of 30.6% quarter-on-quarter and growth of 4.9% year-on-year. Share of loss from Astro is INR 15 lakhs.
Our operating cash flow generation for the quarter has been robust at above INR 18 crores, and our cash balance is at INR 318 crores. ROCE is at 18%. On the outlook for Q4 margins, we expect EBITDA and PAT to be at similar levels of quarter three. I'd like to end with the customary safe harbor statement. Certain statements during this call could be forward-looking statements on our business. These involve a number of risks and uncertainty that could cause the actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking statements. We do not undertake to update any such forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the company unless it is required by law. Over to you, Prateek.
Hello? Hello. Yeah, thank you, sir. Please, you can open the line for question and answers.
Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press Star and one on their touchtone telephone. You will hear a confirmation tone that you have joined the queue. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press Star and then two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. We will wait a moment while the question queue assembles. Our first question is from Prakash Kapadia of Anived Portfolio Managers. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity. A couple of questions. If I look at nine month sales, they are up around 17% at INR 3.23 billion. Ad spends in the same period are up around 21% at INR 1.18 billion. You know, when does this, you know, change? Will it be more price increases going forward, so absolute sales value decreases, or there'll be some, you know, reduction in ad spends, which could happen in the medium term? What is happening, you know, at an industry level? What are we sensing? Any visibility, clarity on some of the ad spends which are still, you know, higher than what we would have wanted it to be. If you could give some color on that.
Yeah. Thank you for asking the question. In terms of the outlook on marketing, the marketing continue going to be at a higher level, because you know, the category, there's no stopping or no decrease in the ad spend of the competitor, because historically marketing spend happening at the high teen level. It's not for that, probably the marketing spend is good, but it will be a bit lower. When the competitor are spending on certain level and related with this, we need to you know, step up our marketing spending as well. It's not that obvious associated to marketing spend, I think. I think you know, it's at a better level.
In terms of the growth, while we are almost like last five quarters, including last quarter, we had a continuous double-digit growth. Last quarter was another quarter we had a double-digit growth. However, it's been born from double-digit growth. This quarter we expect our growth to continue on a double-digit basis. We look to continue to you know grow and continue to widen the gap between us and other players in this space. Always we have a certain level. The marketing spend may come down for a while, but I don't know when, because it's very difficult for us to say that, you know, the category in general, period, high-teen competitive spend, whether it will continue for short-term and long-term, it's very difficult for us to predict.
However, as an organization, our outlook is good. Our growth prospects are good. We continue to market it, continue to drive the growth and probably at a certain point of time the marketing spend comes down. It'll be good even otherwise when we have continued to drive the growth and overall we have on the marketing contributing to even if the marketing spend is continuing at the high teen level. And again, it depends on how the growth possibilities for us, even the marketing spend is further more positive.
Okay. Yeah. We don't see a scenario of, the, you know, earlier case of, say, absolute sales value increasing or pricing changes to negate or counter this higher ad spends.
Again, we look at ARPU to see that it has gone up by, you know, almost like year-on-year growth at 4.2%. We continue to figure out what are the ways to optimize the price and all those things. Price increase is one thing. Now we are not underpricing it. We can look at the optimal various segments, continue to drive some other segments. We look at various ways to build the ARPU. Yeah, price increase, you know, one ultimate thing that something we probably do it at a certain point of time. Timing is not on us.
Sure. That's helpful. Secondly, you know, if I look at, you know, data since our IPO in September 2017, we've, you know, generated around INR 270-odd crore operating cash flow in the last FOUR years. Currently, also on an annualized basis, we generate around INR 80 crore of operating cash flow. That's, you know, INR 350 crore of operating cash flow in the last, you know, 4.5 years since IPO. There is a cash balance of over INR 3 billion. For some reason our market cap is down 18%-20% from IPO price. Why not consider a buyback and, you know, ensure value creation and showcase the market? There is a lot of value in our business.
You know, why I'm trying to make this point here is, you know, unlike some of the newer businesses which have no cash flow, no earnings, we have a genuine business model, genuine cash flow, genuine profits over the years. And you know, as a promoter, if you don't participate, you stake further increases. That is just an observation.
That is a good suggestion. We appreciate that. See, you're absolutely right, you said, you know, it's a company with a strong cash flow generating company. Probably was stated in the past. The entire entity was built with the limited capital. Again, our EBITDA to cash generation has been very healthy. We continue to generate cash. The company definitely know that we are undervalued because the company, if you look at the Q4, we are talking about the double-digit growth. That means, we are getting all more like quarter-over-quarter year-on-year update. We are almost talking about getting close to around INR 120 crores or high-teen%, that's the kind of building value.
That means annualize the company getting almost close to around INR 480-INR 500 crore of that kind of run rate company. We are talking about the cash balance and assets and all those things. As a company, we look at, we definitely underwrite, we know that. You know that as a company, leader in this space, we continue to drive and execute things, and we've been, you know, started growing. This year, for the entire year, we have double-digit growth both on the billing as well as on the revenue side. We continue to grow and continue to drive cash, continue to, you know, grow our market share. We hope that at a certain point in time, the market realizes and rewards us sufficiently.
However, the question now on the buyback and that the board has to decide on, you know, what can do. Sushanth probably can share his views on the question raised by you, yeah.
Capital allocation is definitely that we would continuously consider along with the board. Obviously, you know, buyback dividend, they're all form of capital allocation. We'll have to evaluate at the appropriate time, when the timing is right, when we believe this may be a good idea to do something like that. That's the way to look at it.
Sure. I'll join back the queue for more questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Prakash.
Thank you. The next question is from Vivekanand of Ambit. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much for the opportunity. Muruga, can you please talk about the market response to the new products that you launched, as well as foray into new markets?
Actually, it is in a very early stage, and both are now with the launch of new products. Similarly, in just a few months, it's too early to comment on those things. Bangladesh is, you know, finally able to get the operation going, and we just launched our TV promotion. We just launched our stuff yesterday. I think both are in very, very nascent stages. It may take some time for us to understand and how they work and going to pan out.
Okay. I'm curious to understand this Jodii app, which is a Tamil language app. I know last time also you had said it was very early. But any color that you can provide? I guess it was launched in early November, so you probably are in the third month. How many, you know, are there any metrics that you can share or any sort of color that you can provide on the kind of traction that it is getting? How are you promoting this? Are you aggressively doing TV ads in Tamil channels or is it primarily online marketing? What's the pathway for acquiring users in that app?
I think it's still a few months only we will comment because it's a November and it's a three month. It's still early. I'm getting customer feedback, understand, you know, trying to get the product market fit and trying to, you know, kind of, get that working right. In terms of the segment-wise mix, as a company, as a policy, we don't do the segment-wise breakup because everyone varies the matchmaking size. We don't give a breakup. We talk about overall contract of the matchmaking business. Also the form of marketing do vary for consumer marketing for all our businesses, TV, digital and other consumer marketing. As I said, still very early, and we did launch a TV commercial in, you know, in Tamil Nadu.
Again, it's just you know one or two campaigns. As I said, it's still in a very early stages and so nothing specific to share at this point.
Okay. Next question is on the strategy that we had embraced, say in end of 2020, which is segmented pricing, which allowed us to pursue a lot more users to transact, persuade a lot more users to transact. Are we kind of going back to the original strategy of premiumization now? I mean, we're seeing that the transactions on matchmaking, the paid transactions, they've remained stagnant for the last four to five quarters. Is there a change in stance as far as the segmented pricing strategy goes?
We consider trying various strategies and see what is the right mix of ARPU versus volume and the conversion. We continue to experiment, continue to do those things. We continue to experiment both the things we run and continue to try. Continue to try on one hand segmented pricing, on other hand try to maximize. I think our strategy has been on both sides. There are quarters which we see ARPU moving up, there are quarters we see that the volume moving up. We continue to execute those strategies to drive the revenue. Ultimately, I think it's about drive the revenue.
Okay. Muruga, what gives you the confidence of sustaining double-digit growth, in, you know, in Q4 and going ahead? What are you seeing in the market that convinces you of double-digit growth now?
Yeah. We are later in this stage where we continue to gain market share, continue to execute it well, and we are definitely very confident of double-digit growth, not in this quarter, but continue to, you know, kind of always in the double-digit growth.
Okay. Second set of questions for Sushanth mainly. Sushanth, you said that 4Q EBITDA PAT will be similar to Q3 levels. Why this guidance, given that there's a high chance of double-digit revenue growth? Are your costs going up? Can you give us some color on the AWS migration that you had done? Are those costs in your base? How should one think about the fixed costs now?
Yeah. What has happened is there are two, three factors. One is if you look at our Q2, right, the billings did slow down a bit in Q2. Or rather Q3, I meant. This is now second, sorry, November, December sort of a timeframe, it did slow down. Therefore, you know, the revenue for that, the GAAP revenue, you know, becomes slightly smaller than expected when the billings slow down the previous quarter, which is the quarter three. That is one reason why we have kept flattish, you know, EBITDA and PAT. The second thing is, you know, marketing may move slightly, that can also cause a bit of an impact, you know, from where it is.
The third is, yes, you know, in quarter three, I did allude to that the technology costs did increase a bit. That migration is going on, so that some more costs will come in Q4 as well, because it accumulates over a period of time. All three reasons, you know, the quarter three billing, which did slow down a bit, which causes some impact on revenue for the next quarter, which is quarter four. Slight increase in marketing and as well as some extensive increase in technology costs.
Yeah, just to add to what Sushanth said, if you look at the revenue and the billing with the revenue, the difference will be I think more than probably around $1 million or maybe some plus growth. That's taken up. The difference also will be then we expect that to happen in quarter four because the trends Sushanth had mentioned. There's a gap of at least on the growth. We see that's a possibility or not. That's the kind of thing. Basically, the billing and the revenue can be, we see that, the quarter gap because of the reasons that Sushanth had explained. That, that's one of the reasons of that in markets.
Sushanth, just to understand the margin evolution better, ex of marketing, will we get back to those 65%-66% levels that we had reached quite some time, I mean, just recently, right?
Yeah. You know, I think as we make up our plans for next year, I think we'll have a clearer picture on margins and profitability because we need to look at the full- year into picture. For the next quarter, I believe it will be at sort of similar sort of a level because if I said overall EBITDA and PAT are similar levels, then and it's marketing a slight increase, which also means you know, excluding marketing also will be at very similar sort of levels as for Q3. How we plan out for next year, we need to see the overall growth trajectory, what is the sort of investments that we'll be doing, and we'll have more clarity on this when we come back with the year-end results.
I wanted just to add to that. Definitely we have better clarity next year. Again, the next quarter is also M because part of the marketing digital cost definitely getting back to our 66% or higher revenue increase, that would happen automatically. Because as far as that is cost, you know, let's just say INR 260 million this quarter and cost of doing business up front usually migration and other things. I think progress definitely getting back to the margin of 66% or higher is absolutely not a problem. In fact, part of the marketing will be really the single largest cost in the marketing business. I don't think. Definitely the better clarity next year.
If you look at the outlook, definitely they are getting back to the margin of 66% and above. That can happen in June of next year.
Great. Just one last small data point. What's the cash balance, cash and liquid investments in the current quarter?
INR 318 crores.
You have made all payments for the ShaadiSaga acquisition, right?
Yes. We have done all the payments.
Okay. Thank you very much, and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Kush Kuzrani of Inga Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the opportunity. Hope you guys are doing well. Just wanted to understand what is the quantum of price increase that we have taken in this quarter?
No, we are not at any price increase. In fact, some of the questions were, you know, very close to drive the business. We are not in any price increase for long, long time.
Will we be taking any price increases going ahead, since the advertisement costs are inching up for the next few quarters as well?
We are not, nothing on the price increase on that front.
Okay. That's helpful. In terms of advertisement cost, how do you measure that these increased costs is giving us the ROI on the spend that we do?
See, most of the advertisement is on TV channels and while we definitely see some impact of social aspiration going up and doing TV advertisement, again, very difficult to you know fully quantify the ROI on the TV advertisement. TV advertisement is more of brand building and ensuring that you know brand has a continued visibility and also reach in the market. Also considering that the increased competitive activity, we need to have a certain threshold of the marketing spend. You know that some of the market definitely spending much more than what we look at because the competition in the market are spending much more than what we are thinking it's required in the market. Sometimes shift the spending also required.
TV is more of brand building and sustaining and, it does contribute to the social appreciation to some extent. If you take a pure ROI on TV advertisement, you know you cannot measure that way at all. TV advertisement is necessary. Yeah, it is important to have. Whether some of the free advertisement, it has to, may not be the case, but however, as a quantum, we need to spend a fair amount. Look at digital, we do measure the ROI because digital very easy to measure the ROI because you know the direct link, the result of the effect of the algorithm also. The TV is very difficult, but we definitely have mechanical measure what is being, what can impact technology. You can't fully think ROI with the TV advertisement. It's a.
TV advertisement is brand building long-term, not the particular quarter. Sure, sure. Could you also highlight on in terms of the wedding services business, will we see the run rate now increasing to INR 1 crore per quarter post the acquisition as well? Sorry, I was not. I'm just asking, can marriage services sustain the INR 1 crore revenue per quarter post the acquisition as well? I think it's definitely move up. In fact, you know, we have taken a goal of possibly, you know, taking a target, the goal of taking it to INR 1 crore in 3 years period. That's the goal we are trying to achieve at the moment. Our work will be done on that space and, while the integration still happening is not done yet.
Post integration with Shaadi Saga, hope we'll be able to drive much better numbers as well. You likely will move back to INR 2 crore, which we had, 1.62 crore in the 2022. Am I right? Yeah. We have to get to that kind of numbers. We continue to drive the growth and wedding services should be profitable. We determined the goal is to try and get to INR 1 crore in the next three years. That's kind of goal we are trying to achieve. Again, at this point of time, still the integration is not done and we just hired a marketing sales head of wedding services who just joined us. We hope we'll be able to continue to execute and drive in the space.
We see definite opportunity and we hope we're going to continue to. We'll definitely be able to make the necessary upgrade in the.
Sure, sir. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. The next question is from Aravind of Kotak Investment Advisory. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Now, my question is more to do with the growth of the industry. You know, everybody seems to be spending a lot on marketing. We've also seen, you know, recently you have put out something on your annual, you know, metrics on what's happening in the matrimony market. Everything seems to be moving in the positive direction. The market is pretty big, but yet the industry in terms of size is sitting in the region of around INR 700 crores- INR 800 crores. So I'm just trying to understand what is constraining this industry to grow at about, you know, 20% or 25%, despite all the efforts made by all the players to, you know, step up marketing spend. What is constraining the growth of the industry, you know, from being much higher than it is today?
The marketing is just one of the levers, you know, for the growth. Marketing, you know, I mean, marketing alone cannot drive the growth. This is where, basically we are getting to 100 basis points of growth and building and, for the new side. Our endeavor is to move to much higher growth. Well, I see progress. You know, we definitely move to, you know, consistently double the growth, and we are working towards taking to much higher growth. We believe that as we progress, we'll definitely be able to move to a much better growth in terms of growth percentage. So because not just marketing, we continue to execute well on various, brands and, you know, conversions and other things. So we believe that as the organization as we progress, we'll be able to move to much higher growth percentage.
Do you anticipate that, you know, in the near future, you could actually see growth rates being much higher than what you're reporting right now, at least, you know, moving up like a hockey stick? Or is it, you know, going to be more gradual in terms of, you know, the scale up in terms of growth rate? Because, whenever we look at this industry, the opportunity seems to be pretty big. Also we are seeing significant amount of internet penetration. I think these days even the youngsters want to choose their own partners. Everything seems to be moving in favor. I'm not able to understand why this industry can't grow at about 20%-25%. You know, what efforts being the market leader have you made to grow the market? Yeah, definitely.
You know, we continue to focus and taking steps to definitely move to a that kind of growth rate. Whether, you know, that happens immediately or actual progress, but definitely we are in the right trajectory. Okay. Because the business basically we have a long way, I don't see one quarter suddenly becoming an outlier. We definitely see that. As a director, I see that that's happening. Okay. It happens maybe in the coming quarter or maybe couple of quarters down the line. We definitely see that as a growth trajectory, at least somehow we seem to be trending towards the, you know, better side of the double-digit growth. I'm talking not about Q4. We've got a very good double-digit growth. We definitely tend to move in the direction.
We definitely see that as a company, I see. The director will see that, we'll move into the much higher growth percentage. Also one of your competitors that recently got private equity investment, do you see any behavioral change in terms of pricing, you know, that has happened because of that? Given the fact that your other competitor is also bleeding, when do you think, you know, pricing is going to move up? Because everybody, you know, except yourself is basically not making money in this business. Are we at an inflection point where you will see, you know, players yielding and, you know, prices going up? When we look at our pricing that, we are not except some market, you know, where we are sort of give some discount and everything.
I think our pricing has been sort of independent of the competitors because in the major market we have strong leadership and we don't really worry much about the competitor pricing because we have a strong reach, strong interface, strong brand and everything. Look at our R2 also, I mean, sort of continuously moving up and all. Well, we do offer some discount or some salesman. In fact our pricing is independent of competitors except some market like for North India, where we have to resort to some type of discounting because of the increased competition.
In North India, one sort of market, but again there are players in North India. For us, as a company, the way our outlook is that we continue to see that our growth momentum will continue to increase our gross margin, excluding marketing. We continue to grow revenue also for the target growth. That's definitely looking at. We're gonna focus on our growth, our outlook, our future and yeah. Continue to widen the gross margin throughout the year. That's really how we are seeing our outlook going. The last question I have is on the NRI market.
You know, when do you think that you will achieve, you know, leadership in that market as one of your competitors is ahead of you? How big is that market, right now? The NRI market is not a separate market because India is a multi-region market. NRI market is a market, a very large market. However, NRI market. You know, the market is very divided, you know. For South India and certain markets, we are already South Indians have connections with. Even among NRIs, we have a strong leadership. Only for North Indians and, say, Gujarati, Punjabi, we had one of the competitors has an offer in the north. Net-net, I think NRIs, we may be equal level of market share there. It's not that we'll be.
It's more like a certain segment we are, I believe, strong in. Certain segment of the competitor in NRI market has a much better reach now. Net-net, I think NRI market, we are not behind anybody right now.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Mohit Bhagwani of HDFC Securities. Please go ahead.
Hello. Hi. Yeah, thanks for the opportunity. I have two questions. One is on the ad spends. We are doing about INR 160 crore annual run rate ad spends, right? You mentioned that most of the spend is on TV channel advertisements. Now, I just want to ask, like, what are your thoughts on, you know, shifting this budget towards digital channels where most of the individuals are, especially considering that the young individuals are spending more time on smartphones and social media. Do you believe that, you know, if you deploy other strategies like, you know, influencer marketing, for example, do you believe that, you know, you will shift to that strategy and, you know, increase your spends on that front? That is my first question.
Yeah. Basically, directly with the budget, you know, kind of shifting towards the digital side. However, at this point of time, TV constitutes large segment or large percentage of our ad spends. TV, I think for that category, is the largest part of our marketing spend. However, when you look at it, year-on-year basis, quarter- by- quarter, definitely we are increasing spend on our digital side, which has been growing at a much higher percentage compared to the money we are spending, you know, on the TV side. Basically, the TV forms larger marketing spend. However, digital is a growth marketing channel which has a much higher percentage. We continue to shift our budget to digital side.
Do you believe that, you know, this allocation, right, between TV advertisements and digital will change in the next two to three years? Do you believe that shift will happen? Say if it is 60/40, will it become the other way around? Will it become more of digital in the next few years, and you'll be able to target more users via that?
Yeah. Digital, we continue to, you know, increase the spend on digital. However, it's very difficult for me to say at this point of time whether it's going to be, you know, it'll be other way around in the next two, three years. It all depends on, you know, how the whole thing going to evolve and how the competitors spend on this category. There are multiple factors going to take it. However, I think directly the digital is going to take, you know, more share of our marketing spend. However, I see that, you know, in the coming years, TV continue going to be a large part of marketing.
Sure. Now, sir, next question is on paid subscriptions, right? We are doing about 0.22 million paid subscriptions in a quarter. Just want to understand if you can give us a sense of, you know, how many of these are fresh additions. What I mean by this is like, you know, for the sake of simplicity, if you assume one paid user coming in quarter two and taking a monthly basic package of three months, and if he doesn't find a match, then he comes again and pays again for the first quarter. He's actually a repeat customer of yours.
Out of this 0.22 million in a quarter, how many of these would be, you know, kind of fresh additions who are, you know, paying for the first time on your platform? If you can give a sense on this.
I would say it is within around, you know, 55%-45%, 60%-40%. That's mix between the first-time payments and the renewals, so.
You are saying 60% would be like a first time payment, 40% will be on a renewal side of users, right?
Again, it's between. You can assume 50%-60% is first time payment, 40%-45% renewal. That's a broad mix.
Okay. Yeah. Thank you so much, sir.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Nilesh Shah of Envision Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi, Muruga. Thanks for the opportunity. Just wanted to understand, you mentioned initially that billings were a bit soft in this quarter. Why would that be? Wouldn't this be like pretty much a normal quarter? There was really no significant disruption or anything in terms of socializing. Why would billings have been soft in this, in the quarter gone by?
There is a bit of inertia thing over there. You know, end of short period one thing. Plus also that, the festivals are impacting also, the Diwali and the festive season. We definitely saw, you know, while the Q2 was. I mean, normally the Q2 is traditionally the weak quarter because there is inertia period, and it's somewhat because of the festival and that is having impact on quarter three. Normally for us, the Q2, Q3, I think, normally will get the soft quarters. Q4, Q1 are the best quarters for us working actually. While not too large a financial figure in a quarterly, but in some markets like, say, Tamil Nadu and Andhra, the December month is enough to create stocks. It's called Margazhi in Tamil Nadu and similarly in Andhra as well.
There is a bit of enough material that can actually run impact. Q2, again, is another Q3, still categorized, but obviously softer. Q4, Q1 of the next quarter.
Okay, thanks. Second is ShaadiSaga. You spoke about an aspiration to get to INR 100 crores of revenues in the next three years. Do you think by that point of time, ShaadiSaga would essentially be profitable by then? Or it could still kind of be in an investment mode and it could still be incurring losses then?
We reach that kind of revenue, I think hopefully it's become profitable. I always have said, maybe it's an aspiration number, which is we get a three-year frame between that and next three years we have to get to the number. We've taken a direction not start to get to the number and, you know, chase aggressively to the number. However, you understand the revenue is finally, you know, INR 50 lakhs a month and all. We definitely have a long way to go to get to the number. There's opportunity, and I believe that we'll be able to execute well and able to move to that revenue. When we reach that kind of thing, no reason we should be, you know, losing money. I'm sure that level of revenue should be profitable.
Do you think, getting to this aspiration, we can do this organically? Or you think we'll still have to kind of pursue inorganic growth even to get to this first aspiration of INR 100 crores in revenues?
I think we can do it organically. Because I think lifestyle integration, I think we got a certain type because strength in the product. I think we can able to do that organically.
Okay. The last one is essentially what one of the participants mentioned about, you know, buyback. I strongly urge you to basically, you know, consider a buyback given the kind of cash that we're sitting on, the market cap that we have. The cash that we have is probably in terms of high teens, in terms of market cap. I strongly urge you to consider that. You are the principal shareholder, you are the CEO, you are the Managing Director. I'm quite sure the board is gonna be guided by what you think and what you suggest. I would strongly suggest that we get there, especially if we don't have any significant, you know, plans for inorganic growth.
Thanks, Nilesh. Appreciate it.
Thanks, Muruga. Good luck.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Sonal Minhas of Prescient Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi there, this is Sonal Minhas. I have two questions. First one was just wanted to get some sense from a three, four year perspective on the average age of a user on your platform, which direction has this gone by two? Just wanted to understand that a little bit more. Secondly, on your marketing spend, I think gentlemen before me have asked some questions. Just wanted to understand, as digital becomes more and faster and a higher percentage of your overall spend, do you see your marketing spend tapering? Do you see your overall spends tapering because those are more performance-led and more directly attributable to the users who sign up on your platform? I have these two questions. Thanks.
The average age, if I understood your question rightly, the average age of maybe around, sort of, 26-29, that forms the largest block of male users. Females around, say, 23-25, that forms a large chunk of our base. However, we see that, you know, any growing economy, every 10 years or 15 years, the average age of people getting married slightly move up because people tend to have a higher priority towards their personal growth now. That's normally a trend globally, widely seen. As the country progresses, the people delay their marriage. That seems to happen. In terms of the spend, CAC at this point in time, the TV is currently going to be a large part of our marketing spend.
Definitely, there should slowly happen to the digital side. That's where the growth is happening. Whether it is going to be a large part, even in the case of this point in time, it is definitely a large part of our marketing spend. Again, the marketing spend today, it's not in isolation. Again, some market opportunity we have to spend more than what is required because of, you know, the competitors are spending more than what we think that is required to spend in our category. Sometimes we have to, you know, respond to the competitive marketing spend so to ensure that we continue to grow and protect our market share. If the competitive intensity reduces, obviously our marketing spend, which wouldn't be spending so much.
Look at three years ago, our marketing spend for entire year was at the time of IPO, INR 50 crore.
Yeah.
Now it comes to, say, around like INR 160 crores for many years. Yeah, today, actually we are spending more than what is required. That's unfortunate situation. We, again, I will check that we continue to invest and we continue to grow and maybe in the future sometime, you know, we see that the marketing spend reduces. That time we get the benefits of the reduced marketing expenses.
On a steady state basis, like if you go back to time of your IPO or let's say otherwise, 15%-20% of your top line spend on marketing is like a steady state, stable kind of a marketing spend for this category. Just trying to understand that steady state.
I think this kind of it's a similar level of competition what we had at the time of IPO and or what is required to spend. I think we can manage it under crore marketing spend.
Sorry, INR 100 crore as of now.
Yeah. INR 160 crore probably, you know, maybe can manage it to INR 100 crore now. That's an opportunity we respond with.
understand that. Just trying to understand the first part of the question. You mentioned that now the average age of user is going up with the economy. If on your platform, have you seen, like, as the average age has also gone up, the preference of users for a particular feature or for a particular aspect of service has also changed, or has this happened from a longer three- or four-year perspective, or it has largely remained the same? Just trying to understand what a consumer is needing as the age goes up, basically on that. Do they need more physical interaction? Do they need better features? Do they need other data about the matrimonial partner they want to look at?
What is it that is changing in terms of behavior and aspects?
Usually the core need is to find the right partner, get married. They have to see the right number of matches, and it's trying to do that. As we need to continue to innovate, continue to you know make it easy for user to discover and get connected. The core matchmaking platform continues to be sort of large share of our revenue. As I said, we recently launched Acceptable Matches. It's a patent-pending feature. We are the first one to launch it that it shows the people there the most relevant matches. Sometimes the online match among say people in Mumbai with irrelevant matches. With Acceptable Matches, the number of matches may come down to the users, but user end up seeing relevant matches.
We continue to make progress, innovate, so that you know the people are able to you know see the relevant matches and get connected and get married. However, there isn't any preference going to change. You know, three, four year is too short a time frame trend to be seen now on this. Maybe as a country progresses, when people become more and more busy or other things, probably the need for the personal services, which we can work on all those things. Again, it may not happen in the next two years. In maybe the longer term possibly that may happen.
Sure, sir. Okay. Thanks a lot. This is from Anshul. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Last question is from Deep Shah of B&K Securities. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. Looking at the numbers of one of our other competitor, it seems clear that, even with these numbers, we have gained market share. Could you just elaborate a bit on, you know, what's happening in the northern market and where do we see our share there? That was the first question. Second question is, you earlier said that, you know, we are trying various strategies to mix pricing and, number of transactions, but, the transactions seem to be flattish now for the five, six quarters. If you could give some more idea about, what's happening on that front, that'll be very helpful. Thank you.
Yeah. See, we are continuing to gain our growth across the market. Our growth is not limited to any particular geography of markets. That's a fundamental point. In terms of the paid volume, you know, because we definitely expect the growth momentum to continue. When the growth momentum continues, obviously it will reflect in either on two aspects. Either the volume will move up or ARPU will move up. We continue to drive both of them. When the growth increases, definitely see the effect either in form for volume moving up or ARPU moving up. At this point of time, currently telling you the current mix is ARPU is certain percentage and volume is certain percentage. But the outlook for the coming years when the move up, obviously we see there's now the volume to move up as well.
Right. This is very helpful. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from Sameer Pardikar of ICICId irect. Please go ahead.
Sir, thank you for the opportunity. Sir, what is your accumulated breakup of our marketing spend on TV and digital? Is it 70% on TV, 30% on digital, or is it higher percentage?
We are not giving a good breakup. Majority of our spending is on TV, yes, 70%.
Any ballpark number will be really helpful.
I think majority maybe around 70% or 70%-80%. I don't know exactly, but majority on TV.
Okay. Second thing, sir. We disclose any premium or paid subscribers for us on the call?
No. We don't do any premium paid subscribers. There's no-
Like any-
The only thing is, we can say that one of the reasons for ARPU increases, we've seen good growth in the premium services segment as well. That's why it covers up also.
Okay. One of the competitors on the call said recently that consolidation is a way forward for the matrimony market to grow in India. Any comment from your side?
No, I think we are just focused on driving our growth and continuing to widen the gap with some other players. I think we are so focused, super focused on our growth. If at all anything in the future, we may consider. In fact, for us, I think we can continue to execute our strategic priorities and the plans we have in front of us. I think we'll be able to drive growth. If at all anything but in the future, we may consider.
Anything on the mind for 2022?
No, I just wanna tell you we are focused on our growth.
Okay. Thank you. That's all from me.
Thank you. The next question is from Vivekanand of Ambit. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the follow-up opportunity. One, how much money have you earmarked for new product launches as well as investment in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Muslim matchmaking? That's one. Secondly, we've seen that you invested in ShaadiSaga, you've invested in MatchAstro also. Essentially, you've been making these small acquisitions in the last few years since you got listed. Are there similar such acquisitions available which can supplement the current offering that we have, where you would want to deploy your capital or, you know, given that now we are heading into a scenario where startups may not get funded as easily as they did in 2021? Thank you.
Yeah. In terms of the new acquisition, obviously, we continue to, you know, evaluate any opportunity which can add value to our offering. The ShaadiSaga was a kind of good acquisition because we enhanced our travel plan within ShaadiSaga. MatchAstro was definitely one of the offerings of matchmaking services that we could actually study the astro visions. You know, it was a sort of strategic investment as well. I think if there is any opportunity we can strengthen our offerings or category, we should do that. In terms of the breakup of, you know, the expense-wise, you know, we have the overall marketing spend. We try to, you know, manage according to the need. We try to manage in the overall marketing budget.
It depends on some segment we see the traction, we invest more behind that initiatives. We are almost struggling because, you know, Bangladesh just launched TV campaign, and other things are very recently added. Probably next year, when we do the annual planning, have some better understanding. However, you know, again, we try to manage with the overall spend. Again, it depends on the need, it depends on the opportunity we kind of allocate within the marketing budget. Because the things are dynamic in nature, very difficult to have that specific number for various segment as such. There's a broad number, but some of the things do change. Depends on opportunity, depends on the competition, depends on how the whole thing, how some of the.
How's the response for some of our offerings as well. It's a lot of dynamism also in some of the new ventures. It's very difficult to put a specific number for various segment at this point of time.
Okay, understood. Just one last follow-up. For the international foray, I mean, versus what you had outlined some time ago versus where you are now, I guess there are a few products that you are still to launch internationally, right? By when can we expect you to you know do those launches in a full-fledged manner? I'm referring specifically to the product on the MuslimMatrimony in international markets.
MuslimMatrimony. Already we are continuing to make progress on that market. You know, we are definitely looking at some other offering as well. Probably sometime this quarter we'll be able to launch something for international market.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Okay. If there are no more questions, we can close the call. Great.
Yes, sir, we have no further questions. I'd like to ask you to just make some closing comments.
Thanks, Prateek, and Antique Stock Broking for hosting this call. Thanks, Chris. If you have any further questions, please do get in touch with us. Thank you once again. Thank you for your interest in matrimony.com, and we look forward to seeing you back. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Antique Stock Broking, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.