Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Matrimony.com Q4 and FY25 earnings conference call hosted by ICICI Securities. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Jayaram Shetty from ICICI Securities. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Hi everyone. On behalf of ICICI Securities, I would like to welcome you all to FY25 earnings call of Matrimony.com. From the company, we have Mr. Murugavel Janakiraman, CEO. Over to you, Mr. Janakiraman, sir, for your opening remarks.
Thank you, Jayaram Shetty. Good evening, everyone. I am proud to share that we are across a significant milestone of 25 years, helping millions of people to find a life partner. Reaching this milestone is a testament to the enduring strength of our values, the dedication of our associates, and the trust placed in our brand by millions of our members, partners, and shareholders. FY 2025 was the very first year in our journey of 25 years where we had a degrowth. However, we started year-on-year growth from March onwards. Our year-on-year growth continues in April and May. With the various initiatives and strategies, we are highly confident of continuous growth in the coming quarters and the years to come. We are desperate to pause Wedding Loans as the conversions are not at the expected level, and we may revisit it in the future.
We have changed AstroChat to AstroFreeChat and offer five minutes of free consulting. We are organically generating over 1,000 downloads per day and a few hundred consulting per day. We are still nesting stage on this initiative. This year also marked the successful completion of our second buyback in the last two years. Now, coming to the results. In quarter four, on a consolidated basis, we achieved a billing of INR 114.8 crore, a growth of 5% quarter-over-quarter, and a decline of 5.3% year-on-year. Revenue at INR 108.3 crore, a decline of 2.8% quarter-over-quarter, and 9.1% year-on-year. For the full year, we achieved a billing of INR 452.7 crore, a decline of 5.5%. Revenue at INR 455.8 crore, a decline of 5.3%. Key highlights for the matchmaking business in quarter four are as follows. In quarter four, the billing was at INR 113.5 crore, a growth of 4.8% quarter-over-quarter, and a decline of 4.8% year-on-year.
Revenue at INR 107.5 crore, a decline of 2.8% quarter-over-quarter, and 9.1% year-on-year. For the full year, the billing was at INR 448 crore, a decline of 4.7%. Revenue at INR 450 crore, a decline of 4.7%. We added a INR 2.5 lakh paid subscription during the quarter, a growth of 3% quarter-over-quarter, and a decline of 9% year-on-year. We added close to 1 million paid subscriptions during the year. ATV for the matchmaking business grew by 1.7% quarter-over-quarter and 4.5% year-on-year, in line with our customer acquisition strategy. For the full year, ATV grew by 2.7%. We created about 22,000 success stories in the quarter. Now, coming to the marriage services business, the billing was at INR 1.2 crore, a growth of 19.1% quarter-over-quarter, and a decline of 36.6% year-on-year. Revenue was at INR 1.3 crore, a decline of 0.8% quarter-over-quarter, and 12.8% year-on-year.
For the full year, the billing was INR 4.7 crore, a decline of 46.4%, and revenue was at INR 5.9 crore, a decline of 34.7%. Loss in the quarter for the wedding services and also for the new initiatives put together was INR 4.9 crore as compared to the loss of INR 3.8 crore in Q3 and INR 2.4 crore in FY 2024 quarter four. For the full year, losses were at INR 14.5 crore as compared to loss of INR 10.3 crore in FY 2024. On the billing and outlook for quarter one, we expect growth in matchmaking business year-on-year and also growth in wedding services revenue year-on-year, which means the billing side has a growth year-on-year. Let me pass to Sushanth on the key profitability highlight. Sushanth, over to you.
Thanks, Murugavel. Good evening, everyone, for joining us today. Our EBITDA margin for the matchmaking business in Q4 is at 17.7% as compared to 18.7% in Q3 and 19.1% a year ago. For the full year, EBITDA margin for matchmaking was at 20.5% as compared to 20.9% in 2024. Marketing expenses are at INR 46.7 crore as compared to INR 46.2 crore in Q3 and INR 47.9 crore a year ago. Marketing expenses for the full year were at INR 185.2 crore as compared to INR 182.5 crore in 2024. Excluding marketing expenses, our margins in matchmaking are at 62% in 2025 as compared to 60% in 2024. On a consolidated basis, our EBITDA margin in Q4 is at 10.8% compared to 12.4% in Q3 and 14.2% a year ago. For the full year, our EBITDA is at INR 63.8 crore as compared to INR 73.4 crore in 2024, a decline of 13.2%.
Tax rate in the quarter is at 19.8% as compared to 17.65% in Q3, and for the full year, 21.65% as compared to 23.42% in FY2024. This lower tax rate in the current year is due to long-term capital gain tax benefits on account of the holding period of our investment and to the lower tax rate compared to last financial year. PAT is at INR 8.2 crore, a decline of 17.9% quarter-on-quarter and 30.3% year-on-year. Share of loss from our associate AstroVision is INR 0.01 lakh in Q4. PAT for the full year is at INR 45.3 crore as compared to INR 49.6 crore in FY2024, a decline of 8.6%. Cash balance is at INR 324.3 crore, and return on capital employed is 14.2%.
On the outlook for Q1 FY26, though we will have year-on-year billing growth in Q1 FY26, however, due to lower billings in Q4 FY25, the Q1 PAT will be better than Q4. However, it will be less than Q1 of last financial year. We expect year-on-year PAT growth from Q2 FY26 onwards. Other announcements in the quarter are as follows: The Board of Directors at its meeting held on 15th May 2025 have recommended a final dividend of 100%, subject to approval of shareholders. I would like to end with a customary safe harbor statement. Certain statements during this call could be forward-looking statements on our business. This involves a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially from the such forward-looking statements.
We do not undertake to update any such forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the company, unless it is required by law. Thank you, and now we are ready to take questions. Handing over to Jayaram, ICICI Securities. Thank you.
Thank you, Sushanth.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Rishabh Shah from Bugle Rock Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Thanks for the opportunity. We have entered the North India market, which is dominated by Shaadi.com, for quite some time. Now, we spend a lot of money to gain market share out there. Were we able to gain market share over these years, and what steps did you take to win market share out there?
Thank you, Rishabh, for asking the question. Yes, it's important that North India, other than the North India market, we are a leader across India. North India definitely is a market we like to grow our market share and win in the long term. At this point in time, what we are looking at is that we are looking at having a continuous visibility because it was not the case last couple of years. We optimized our marketing campaign strategy. Only for the last couple of quarters, we are having a regular visibility in the North India market. We intend to continue our visibility in the North India market so that we could gain market share in the long term. It was not the case in the last three years. It was more of on and off.
Now, we are definitely looking at regular advertisement in the North India market.
Apart from that [Crosstalk]. Can I follow up? Okay, sorry. No, please continue. [Crosstalk]
I'm sorry?
Please continue, sir.
Yeah, yeah. We also, apart from BharatMatrimony.com, we also add our CommunityMatrimony as a strategy to grow into the North India market. We are looking at some, apart from BharatMatrimony, whether it could also promote the CommunityMatrimony in the North India market. Considering that we spent, we had to look at the best way to promote the CommunityMatrimony in the North India market. We are looking at a combination of BharatMatrimony and the CommunityMatrimony. Maybe in the future, we may also look into taking other brands to the North India market. If we're not looking at BharatMatrimony, maybe a combination of brands possibly. Again, these are the something, but at this point in time, we are looking at a regular visibility in the North India market.
Just a follow-up on this one, sir. As you said, it has been three years. What changes have you seen up till now, or we've not been able to crack that market itself?
No, as I told you, it was, first of all, we didn't have that regular person in the North India market because of the way the overall market is spent and the challenge of having that spend in the North India market. Now, the way you have optimized and the way the budget is getting allocated, definitely, we are looking at regular persons. I think one of the reasons we didn't have the regular person in the North India market. We see that with the reverse communication strategy, regular persons, and we could be able to penetrate or gain markets in the North India market.
My second question is, sir, last year, the advertising spends were 39% of our top line. This year also, it is around 40%-41%. It has been increasing consistently despite our efforts into marketing and advertising spending. Sir, we are not able to see the revenue increasing at that pace. What am I missing out, sir? Could you please help me out in this? I understand that this business requires marketing and advertising spend. Sir, we can't just keep burning cash, although we are not getting fruits out of it.
Last year was one of the years where the overall industry had a degrowth in the profile. Again, probably due to the post-COVID effect where during the COVID term, there is a surge in the profile. After that, there is a thing. I think we see that things are getting normalized. We see that year-on-year growth in the profiles. In terms of marketing spend as a percentage of revenue, when the revenue starts moving up, the marketing spend as a percentage of revenue will come down. We do not see the marketing spend going to increase from the current level of spend at this point in time. The marketing spend will remain at this level, maybe automatically at less level. Or maybe I can assume that at this point, it will be at a similar level.
The revenue increases, so we see the percentage of spend on marketing which comes up, sir.
Okay. So my last question is, Matrimony caters to which segment of the crowd? Is it the people who are not there with their family who stay alone? Or they stay alone, so they think to find a match in the community is better? Or people also living with parents also register for matrimony?
I think Matrimony is a very broad basis, not a segment of the population. In 25 years, millions of people use a—we sign up with the surge on a yearly basis. I would not say that only one segment. Whether the individuals are looking for taking the lead or the parents are taking the lead, we may know the majority of users are individuals themselves. Definitely, the way that the matrimony industry has transformed the way Indian people find a life partner. What it was that years ago, the parents were on a driver's seat to today, the youngsters are on a driver's seat. Again, they also take the consent of parents. Yes, there are certain personal parents who use a platform. However, the majority of the individuals are using a platform.
However, it's called marriage happens with the consent of parents, but the youngster being a driver's seat. It's a broad base. It's not limited to one segment, and it's across the tiers, across the segments, across the globe, yeah.
Thanks, sir. I'll get back in the queue. Thank you.
Thank you, Rishabh.
Thank you. We will take our next question from the line of Damodaran from Acuitas Capital. Please go ahead.
Thank you, sir, for the opportunity. My question is on capital allocation and, I mean, similar to the previous participants. The question is on ad spend. Now, over the past four, five years, we have increased ad spend, but we have grown slower than the second-largest player, at least. I mean, their numbers are available till FY2023. One reason obviously could be because online matchmaking has a deeper penetration in the South with BharatMatrimony. In FY, I mean, this current year, despite all the increase in ad spend with the entire industry and you as well, revenues and profiles have declined. In light of all this, do you really think that you need to spend so much on advertising? Because while we are increasing ad spends, revenues have not really grown at pace or, I mean, penetration has not really improved significantly.
Don't you think, I mean, you can do away with the, I mean, the ad spend a bit? Also considering the fact that the third-largest player has regained their, I mean, Jeevansathi has almost touched their INR 100 crore revenue from which they had actually declined over two, three years ago. And they have achieved this while cutting down ad spend. Do you really need the current level of ad spend? That is the first question. I'll answer the second question after hearing your response.
Regarding that, we look at the third player. In fact, it was a revenue, probably to go back to the thing, it was a revenue they were doing in the past also. They significantly subdued the marketing. That significant stepping over the marketing for them did not yield the desired results. It was changed to a different model. However, they do spend money on marketing. Again, it has gone back to the early level of the marketing spend and limited to only one geography, which is the North Indian market. It is more like gone back to the earlier level. I would say that was the reason for the reduced marketing spend. That revenue gone back because if you only increase the marketing spend going after various markets, they are not getting the desired results for them.
With respect to our marketing spend at the elevated level because there are other players as well. At this point in time, marketing spend is at an elevated level. If the competition intensity reduces, we will reduce the marketing spend. At this point in time, there are players who are spending at a similar level. It's important for us to spend a lot on marketing. Plus, we also have multiple brands. We also have new brands like Jodi. We are initially beginning those brands to grow those brands, Jodi as well. In terms of the growth, we now see that, as I said, while the last year was one of the years the industry had some challenges in the profile growth, we now see that the profiles are bouncing back.
Started March, we are having year-on-year growth, and the continuing year-to-year growth continued May. When the growth happens, then we see that now the marketing, in the past, the marketing spend has gone up. Now, we expect the marketing spend to remain at a similar level or it may even come down also. When the revenue increases, then marketing spend will, in a certain way, come down. Lots of profit will increase. In case that the active progress with the company intensity reduces, we may reduce the marketing spend. Look at the second thing that because of the one issue is one side. Other issue is also the Google, other things because of the increased spend that the marketing spend also goes up, that the cost of marketing also goes up also. The thing is that marketing, we do not expect to further increase.
Either remain at the same level or it may come down. Also, we have to keep in mind that now we are using the similar marketing spend also to promote our other brands. We started investing in Community Matrimony. We started investing in Jodi. Basically, with the same marketing spend, now we started investing in other brands as well. Those initiatives may yield returns as well.
Sure. Okay. Correct me if I'm wrong. I mean, you said in the two, three calls, the previous call, you said that you're going to optimize on certain spends. What is the plan? I mean, were you referring to marketing solely or were there other spends as well which you had in mind for the coming year that you plan to optimize?
Definitely, we see that there will be increasing TV spend. That may come from the online that some optimization happened online, and we'll be able to plow back that into the TV because in North India, where we are not investing sufficiently, now we're starting Q2, Q3 almost, we are starting investing in North India consistently. It's also coming from the way the optimized and the organized marketing strategy and marketing campaigns. It's coming from that. Plus, also, we continue to do leverage technology AI to run efficient operations. Wherever we're able to optimize, and we continue to do that. In terms of, as I said, overall, the marketing spend remains at the similar level, but still, you can be able to continue that in North India and also investing in the other brands of Matrimony. It's all coming from the same marketing perspective.
It remained at the same level. I just want to tell you that we are investing in multiple brands. It's not only BharatMatrimony.
Okay. The other question was on, I mean, new initiatives. As I look at your P&L, you have increased the costs have gone up in marriage services. It is currently, I mean, around INR 6 crore for the cost. Your overall loss, as you pointed out, is around INR 3 crore. Are any of those businesses close to breakeven, which you have kind of alluded to? I mean, you had plans of breaking even the marriage services business earlier in FY 2024. Are we anywhere close to breaking even in any of the new businesses, or what is the outlook there in terms of how much capital will we need to spend? Can you give some update there?
Basically, all those include the marriage services, only one part of it. Lots of inputs, marriage services, you and I have tried a Wedding Loan and ManyJobs, the investment is happening. WeddingL oan, as I said, with the conventional not at expert level, it is yet to pass. With respect to ManyJobs, so far, we have almost invested in the last couple of years. The monetization for ManyJobs will start very soon, so maybe next month or maybe subsequent month. We reach a desired level of registrations and, let's say, employers, and we are intending to monetize in the near future. So far, they're all in investment mode. With respect to wedding services, the initiatives on weddings, the MakeMyW edding, we expect to even undertake bookings. There are some interesting things happening. It also includes AstroFreeChat.
All this put together is for an initiative. We definitely see that the growth is happening because, as I said, probably ManyJobs we're going to monetize in the coming months. We hope it will become kind of successful. Based on the success, we're forcing someone to figure out the strategy for other markets going forward. It's not only wedding services. Now the wedding loan has been stopped, so you may see some losses coming down because of that business being passed.
Sure. Perfect. So it will be in that same range of INR 10 crore-INR 12 crore for this year as well? Is that how we should look at it?
Yeah. Probably with better clarity, we're going to start monetizing. Maybe one quarter down the line, we'll have better clarity. Maybe at this point, we can be asked for maybe INR 10 crore or less, yeah.
Okay. Sure. I have some other questions. I'll call back into the Q&A now.
Sure. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Vasudev from True Value. Please go ahead.
Hello. Good evening, sir.
Good evening, Vasudev.
Hello?
Yeah. Yes, Vasudev. I can hear you. Please go ahead.
You can hear me, no?
Yes. I can hear you
sir, on your silver jubilee.
Thank you so much, yeah. Thank you.
Looking at your figure, sir, there has been a decline in all aspects, billing, revenue, and profit, sir. The earlier speaker has pointed out you are nearest to competitors. Shaadi.com almost takes the phone. Of course. Is the management slightly become complacent about growth, sir? What are the steps you have taken to shore up the revenue, sir?
I don't know whether the revenue number of the thing, which is not in the public domain. In terms of our initiatives, we're definitely taking various initiatives to grow. As I said, last year was one of the years where in the 23 years, we had a degrowth because overall, the industry had a degrowth in the profile. In the absence of the information about the players, I'm not able to comment on them because we only have the public number of a few years ago. Yeah, sometimes the possibility of the play will maybe some strategy would have worked better for them. However, we are taking steps, and we definitely see that we are once again back in growth. As I told you, in the last three months, we are having year-on-year growth.
The outlook for us, we believe that there's various initiatives, be it the product initiatives, be it on the product side as well as on the marketing strategy to drive the profile, plus conventional strategies. We definitely see once again the back and the growth part. Starting this year, we see that in quarter- one- quarter, well, actually Q1, we'll definitely have the building growth, but it may take one more quarter for the revenue growth to happen because there will be a one-quarter gap between the building and revenue growth. We see definitely the growth is coming back, and the profit will also move up because the market is going to a similar level. I feel now we are once again back in touch. It's not that the management has become complacent. Sometimes there are phases we go through, but we are definitely very resilient.
We have done some interesting stuff as well on the product side. BharatMatrimony, we can also easily navigate to the CommunityMatrimony and the product integration. If someone is creating a profile in BharatMatrimony, same day, they can deactivate a profile in CommunityMatrimony. Like I said, we continue to do various initiatives. We feel confident of the growth, which already happened. Not complacent. Definitely, we are all the more upbeat, and the team is very agile and focused on driving all aspects.
Hello. My next question, gentlemen. You are having excess cash. Whatever you are having, you are giving in the way of dividends and buybacks, sir. Why not you go for acquisitions from others, sir?
If there is any, we've done some investment in the past and acquisition. There are many right opportunities. We definitely look into it. We assume further we continue to keep these options open in terms of any opportunity to acquire a company in a related industry. We don't see any opportunity to acquire in the matchmaking business, matrimony business. If there are any related or growth opportunities, we definitely look into it. That's something as we progress. We definitely not looking only at organic growth. We definitely look at inorganic growth strategy as well. That's one of our growth initiatives. Maybe so far, we are not focused much on. Maybe in the coming years, we may look at opportunities within the company.
My next last question, sir. When the new CFO you are going to appoint, sir?
Next month, yeah.
Next month. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you for your time. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Vasudev.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Ankur Jain from Priyas Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks for taking my question. Mr. Murugavel, I had a couple of questions. The first question is about the profiles. We see that the industry had a degrowth in the paid profiles last year. Did you, I mean, did the industry degrow in the free profiles as well? That is the number we used to have a couple of years back, and now we do not have that number. Directionally, was there a degrowth in the free profiles as well?
Yeah. Yeah. The industry growth, what I meant was based on the information cost of Google. The overall industry had degrown the profile last year. Again, I feel it has to do with the COVID effect because of COVID, there was a surging profile. I believe that some other people will probably advance the registration because when they're sitting at home, probably nothing else to do. They probably advance the registration. Possibly could have to be one of the reasons. Having said that, we also done our marketing strategies as it is there. We have done the various online and offline strategies. Once again, we see that we are back on the growth, both in terms of profile and also as our other initiatives also. Now, we have started growing, actually. Last year, there was a growth in this way on the free profile.
That's the information we got from Google, yeah.
Okay. Thanks. Another question is about monetization of profiles that most people, they create their registration on different websites. On Matrimony, they are taking a free registration. They are able to see profiles of the opposite members, of the opposite sex. I mean, do you face this problem where the people who are on free profiles, they check the profiles and then look for contacts on Facebook and LinkedIn in order to avoid paying the fee? Do you face this problem? If yes, how do you tackle this problem?
These are very, very insignificant problems because maybe rarely people may do it. I do not think it will be accepted by the opposite member nicely that if someone does not want to pay money and is contacting outside the medium. That sort of shows the character of the person. Whether someone wants to get married to a person is something people need to think. We do not see that as a problem, but very rarely do come across, but we do not see that as an issue, actually. Our conversion percentage remains strong, and we are continuing to look at various initiatives to increase the conversion percentage as well.
Okay. Great. Another question is on the Google billing, this issue. What is the update on the case? That is one. I read in the notes to account that Matrimony changed the business model in order so that it is not covered by that particular payment system. Could you please update on that overall issue? That is one. In the interim, is Google still invoicing Matrimony, and are you still paying 4% as was directed by the court earlier?
No, actually, it's not the case because there's a CCI verdict against Google that the Google billing was a bit of dominance. On the research as a billing against CCI, the investigation is going on. There's a directive by CCI to Google. Recently, CJEU [guess] also upheld the Google order. At this point in time, we are all the productors. There are no issues. There are no payments to Google, and it's not required. With respect to the globally, there are a lot of developments also happening. You may have seen in Apple, there's a verdict against Apple in the U.S. court that Apple has opened up the payment policy, which Apple is much more involved in the global market. The judge went heavily against Apple, saying that in fact, they initiated criminal contempt against Apple as well because not obeying their court order.
Apple immediately opened up that, "Oh, the people can communicate the payments in the app, so only for the U.S. market." Globally, it's happening. It's a matter of time because in India, already, the Google payment policy was there in terms of dominance. The research as a billing initiative going on. At this point in time, we are protected, and we hope it continues.
Okay. So just to clarify, Google is not invoicing in the interim, and there are no payments that you are making as per the earlier court orders?
Yes. Yeah.
Okay. Good. Finally, my question on the wedding services business, that the break-even that we envisaged, that has not come and the profitability is still a little distant. Are there any plans to exit certain segments like Mandap, etc., where the bargaining power of the Mandap owners may be quite high and the fruits are not reaping? Do you have any plans to exit?
No. Actually, we don't mind exiting things where we feel that it's not working well. As I told you, wedding is the only one thing we see at this point of time is not required. The wedding services, the new model, what we are trying to do is a MakeMayW edding where the customer needs to pay money to avail wedding services. By facilitating the service, we also get the commission from the service provider. That's something we are working on. Apart from that, we are optimizing the cost and the wedding services, trying to achieve the break-even. This new model launched a few months ago. We are now passing this month 100+ booking. We have to fulfill the service delivery to get the commission. That's something we are working on.
Again, the losses, not only in the wedding services because it also includes the investment on ManyJobs and other initiatives as well. As I told you, ManyJobs we intend to monetize in the coming months. We hope, I think, the wedding services to break—it's not about breaking the wedding services. It's more of accelerating growth in things. We are continuing to try out things. If things work out, then the scale-up will be much better. It's more like we want to get that right, that sweet spot and the right point of the growth where we are confident and scaling up significantly. We are trying something. Maybe this year, we have some better clarity on some other initiatives on the wedding services.
Okay. Thanks. Sure. Sure. Thanks and all the best.
Thank you. Thank you. Good day.
Thank you. We will take our next question from the line of Madhur Rathi from Counter Cyclical Investments. Please go ahead.
Sir, can you please share the success stories that were there in this quarter?
I'm sorry?
Success stories that you mentioned earlier quarter. What was the success for this quarter?
22,000.
Okay. Sir, if I look at our success stories as an issue to the number of sales subscription we have, then in FY2020, it was around almost closer to 14%. That has been going down every quarter. Every year, it is now around 10%. Is there an issue with getting people on our platform that you are having to grow the billing? Or, sir, is there something else that we cannot see right now? This might be an issue for growth to happen or have to saturate our application. If some data on that would be very useful.
Sorry, there's a little bit of noise. I hope to—
Yeah. Can I repeat my question?
Yeah, please go ahead.
Yeah. Yeah. So, sir—
Can you be a little louder? Your voice is coming very low. We cannot hear you.
Yeah. I'll do that. I'll do that. Just a moment. Is it better right now?
Yeah. Yeah. Please go ahead, sir.
Yeah. Sir, so I wanted to understand, is there any problem, issue with getting the number of people on our platform, that is, the eligible candidates? Or is there an issue with people not getting enough out of our platform? Because, sir, when I look at our success stories, we were issued a number of paid subscribers that we have had. It was around 15% in FY2020. But that time it used to be 11%. It has been consistently in 10%-11% range for the last since FY2021 to FY2025. Sir, so I'm trying to understand, is there any issue with our platform? Or is there an issue where the eligible candidates are not finding enough success rates? That's why they are not subscribing to a longer time plan or something else? So I wanted to understand on that.
Yeah. I understood now. Thank you for asking the question. I don't think it has anything to do with the platform or the thing. Last year also, one of the years while the profile degrowth happened. Also, some of the markets were—it had a prolonging last year, particularly a market like Anuragpur-based. Also, the success story is not something—it's not mandated by some rule. May inform something, may not inform. Also, it has to do with the number of the weddings, number of wedding days, and many things when factors on the success rate being reported. We don't think that we have any issue on that front, actually, whether it is due to the platform or other reasons. We definitely don't see that as an issue. We actually project definitely more marriages now.
Sir, how do we plan to increase the number of paid subscribers on our platform? Also, we are trying some strategies that we are following. Sir, if you could just help us understand, where are you on that? To whatever extent you can, what are the measures that we have taken on that?
On increasing the subscriptions, the paid subscriptions. Was that your question?
Yes, sir.
Okay. Okay. Sir, the increasing paid subscription is one of two things. One is that we have to increase overall the profiles, members signing up on the platform. The second one is that increase the conversion percentage. We continue to take steps to do that pricing strategy to drive the conversions for various segments of the customers. Also, we continue to drive the profile growth. The two levers are increasing the profile and increasing the conversion. The conversion based on the segmenting, pricing, and various strategies. The profile growth, the marketing strategies, and the communication strategies, yeah.
Okay. Sir, just a final question from my end. Sir, regarding what would be the average timing or what the average—I would say the timeline package that a candidate would buy, sir, are there any possibilities of increasing the timeline or going for a three-month package to a six-month package? Is there a possibility for that? Is there a possibility for going for a lower-month package but at a higher price that will drive our R2 growth forward? Sir, is there any possibility of either of two?
Yeah. So it may take an average of nine to 12 months for someone to find a life partner. We have various packages. We have from three months to the one-year package. It is ideally better if someone goes for the one-year package because of the benefit it brings and also the cost advantage. Some people do prefer taking—or majority prefer taking—a shorter duration of the package. On average, what we've seen is that it takes probably around nine to 12 months. While there are people who got married with the one-year, the first contact, there are people who take a year as well. I mean, just talk average, it may take kind of nine to one year to find a life partner. Again, it depends on individual.
Our push to get people to go for a higher duration, but majority prefer to go for a shorter duration.
Sir, so can we increase the R2 growth forward by just staying on the timing of the monthly or quarterly packages? Is there a possibility for that going forward?
Sorry. Going forward, what was the question?
Sir, if can we, sir, increase our R2 growth just based on increasing the pricing for these shorter timeline packages and just staying on that term?
Understood. Understood. Yeah. No, we definitely employ various pricing strategies to drive the growth and also conversion. We continue to do so, sir.
Okay, sir. Sir, thank you so much and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. We'll take our next question from the line of Kashyap Shah from Burjil Drop Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. Hello Murugavel [guess]. I have two questions. From a volunteer perspective, has the trend and the mindset of people changed rather than going to Bumble or Tinder? Is it better to find a match on Matrimony? Why so? As we see, these apps, the users are increasing at a rapid pace in the last four to five years. Why would the current generation want to go to Matrimony and find their match? Your view, sir.
Definitely, Matrimony is the most credible custody, and the intention was very clear. Someone looking for a life partner to get married, Matrimony should be the de facto choice for individuals. The platform, like what you told, and other things. People go there for various reasons, which you may know. In fact, the challenge with the platform is the intent of users also there, the percentage of the female profiles. We do not—it definitely comes through when people are clear about wanting to get married, and Matrimony is the platform. While there may be some customer users, they may want to explore, and they may have the intention to get married, but they may use this platform. One of the reasons we also launched the experience at Luv.com, helping the people who want to fall in love and get married.
That's something we just kind of launched. We are fine-tuning it. We are relaunching it again. Definitely, when it comes to marriage, matrimony sites are the most preferred choice. There may be some customer people, but that's not large enough.
Sir, my second question is, in Matrimony, we have many categories for services we offer. So the Elite Matrimony which we have, so are we focusing more on that Elite Matrimony because, let's say, average revenue per user is higher than the rest of the services we have? Or how is our time allocated between all the services you are offering to the customer?
Sure. Definitely. We are the pioneers of the Elite Matrimony. We are the first one in India to launch an exclusive matrimony service for rich and affluent. I'm the brand Elite Matrimony almost like 17 years. Again, the segment of the percentage of elite is less. Having said that, as Raji said, it's a high ARPU [guess]. We are definitely looking at growing all businesses and not that we're just focusing on one part of the business. We have various business sets, and there's a focus and drive for all the various initiatives or various brands for that matter. Elite is one of the opportunities. As I told you, we are the pioneers, and we help the whole of India to find a life partner. We are large with elite profiles among the industry. Elite is definitely one of the focus areas for our growth.
Okay. Okay. Thanks, sir. Thank you so much.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Vedant Sarda from Nirmal Bang Securities. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. Can you listen to me?
Yes. Please go ahead, Vedant.
Sir, my question is, I just heard some dispute with Google. Are we currently working with Google Advertising?
Yeah. Yeah. Google, we continue to—we spend a lot of money on Google. Yeah.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah.
Thank you. We will take our next follow-up question from the line of Damodaran from Acuitas Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the opportunity again. In your opening remarks, you had mentioned that this is the first year that you've seen this big growth. Is this attributable to some—I mean, are you seeing some structural change in the online matchmaking market wherein people are either shifting to other mediums or looking at alternatives like offline brokers or waiting matches? Is that what's the reason behind this decline in profiles? Or does it have something to do with the fact that we are in the southern market and it's already, I mean, fairly penetrated? If you want to grow, you have to look at other markets. Just wanted your thoughts on that.
No. Actually, it has nothing to do with the pipelines of the other platform. I think one of the reasons is that normally there's a certain customer, people will come, and there will be some increase in the profiles. I think my thing about during the COVID times, there was a surge in the profiles, and probably pipeline at once, that probably got normalized. It is not limited to one particular market. It's south, or west, or east, or north. It's a big growth across the market. I believe that one of the years. It has nothing to do with any structural or any shift in the category and all. It definitely is one of the years. Also, in terms of the south, no, actually, we are number one player, except the north Indian market. We are beat the west, beat the east, beat the south.
The level of leadership varies from market to market. North is one market where we are one of the leaders. We definitely, as I said, are taking steps to grow in the long run. We intend to advertise on an ongoing basis. In terms of things, yeah, it has nothing to do with our strong penetration in the southern market. The big growth was across the market. It is not powerful, but it is overall interested to grow as per the Google.
Yeah. So, sir, correct me if I'm wrong. I mean, the profiles on your app are generally there for like nine or 12 months. So even if there was a temporary increase during COVID time, that would have normalized in the next year. We are almost three or four years past. So wouldn't—I mean, if there was a normalization, that would have happened in 2022 or?
Again, the degrowth was not—if you look at our degrowth on billing, it was only 5%. Even talking about the people at 2022, we are talking about 2024. It's two years after the COVID. It is that—so that way it should be seen as. Again, that's one of the logic to it, whether that's the reason or that's my view based on what we've seen it now. In 2021, 2022, we are in second phase, and second wave of COVID happened. I attribute that growth could be on account of some advance in Matrimony holders. Again, the growth is only 5% on things, and total growth would have been some little more than that thing. However, now we are once again back in the growth part. We attribute to that one.
I couldn't think of anything else, but I think it has to do with the category shift or other things.
Okay. Sir, just internally, I mean, I'm sure you must be tracking a lot of metrics, but your customer satisfaction scores and the customer engagement scores or all those metrics, have they shown any kinds of—I mean, have they shown any decline or are you seeing something that is—I mean, that you've not seen there before? Any cause of alarm there?
No, nothing. In fact, your product continues to get better, and we continue to make good improvements on the product side, customer experience side, and the metric side as well.
So you do have—I mean, you have ways of tracking customer satisfaction and?
Yes.
Sure. Okay, sir. That's all from me, sir. Thank you.
Yeah. Thank you, Damodaran.
Thank you. Before we take the next question, participants, in order to ask a question, you may press star and one. The next question is from the line of Dinesh Kumar, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hello, sir?
Yes, Dinesh. Hello, Dinesh Kumar. Please go ahead. Yeah, please go ahead, Dinesh Kumar.
Yes. Hello. So can you give a revenue guidance for next financial year or revenue top-line growth?
No, actually, we just kind of highlighted what is the coming quarter. We definitely expect the billing growth to continue the way it outlooked for this year. We are not sharing or not talking about the growth percentage for the coming year. Our objective is to continue to drive the growth, but we definitely see that the billing growth is happening in this quarter, and we expect the growth momentum to continue.
Okay.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as there are no further questions from the participants, I would now like to hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.
Thank you so much, Jayaram Shetty and ICICI Securities for facilitating the call. I look forward to continuing to stay in touch with our investors. Any questions, feel free to please reach us. Thank you and have a good evening and next weekend.
Thank you. On behalf of ICICI Securities, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.