Yelp Achieves Profitability For First Time, Announces 72 Million Mobile Users

Yelp just announced Q4 2014 and full year results. Revenue came in at just under $110 million for the quarter, which represented 56 percent growth over 2013. For the full year Yelp announced $377.5 million in revenue. That was 62 percent more than in 2013.

Overall the company slightly beat Wall Street estimates for revenues and earnings per share. More significantly Yelp achieved full year profitability for the first time in 2014.

The company said that its body of reviews grew 35 percent year over year to 71 million total reviews. In Q4 were 135 million monthly unique visitors and 72 million mobile uniques, up from 53 million in Q4 2013. However quarter over quarter mobile was essentially flat. Desktop growth was flat year over year.

Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman said on the earnings call, “We’ve reached peaked desktop.”

Yelp also reported 93,700 active local business accounts. It said that there were roughly 84,000 local advertisers on the site on a global basis. The company has roughly $400 million in cash and cash equivalents.

Roughly 32 percent of local advertisers on the site are buying “packaged CPC.” Average spending is between $300 to $500 per month. The company added that it still has substantial unsold inventory though some categories and geographies in the US are already very competitive.

Yelp said that in Q4 its Yelp Platform program drove “approximately 350,000 transactions.” It also reported that “more than 60,000 businesses [are] integrated into Yelp Platform through its 12 partners.” Yelp doesn’t make much money through Yelp Platform; it’s primarily a consumer service but also helps Yelp prove ROI to its businesses.

International monetization is just 3 percent of total revenue. Accordingly the company expects considerable growth from non-US markets in the future.

Yelp anticipates $114 million to $116 million in Q1 2015 revenue. Full year guidance was $538 million to $543 million. The company said that it believes it can achieve long-term EBITDA margins of between 35 and 40 percent.