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From 2017 to 2018, they added 147 new paying customers. Of which, 57 were enterprise and based on their metrics claiming > 80% of revenue was from these "enterp

From 2017 to 2018, they added 147 new paying customers. Of which, 57 were enterprise and based on their metrics claiming > 80% of revenue was from these "enterprise" deals, probably high dollar. Still, ~$50m in marketing/advertising spend to earn 147 new paying customers (340k/customer) seems high to my untrained eye. Do those enterprise deals and that "132% Dollar Expansion Rate" justify such high CPA? Those with experience with this kind of enterprise-focused company - is this normal?

ec109685 7y ago
Those enterprises are re “-occurring revenue, so I am sure their LTVs are factored in with the spend.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  Depends. If you don't get the "whole enterprise" the part of the enterprise you got could be easily lost because of a top down "everybody is going to use X" or "why do we have Y different vendors for Z?" type of situations.
  - fasteddie 7y ago
    Sure, but that's factored into LTV calculations. If the average customer lasts 5 years before they churn because "Everyone is using X", then you get 5 years of recurring rev off that marketing spend.
- merreborn 7y ago
  And their biggest enterprise customers are paying fastly at least 6 figures annually
taytus 7y ago
>~$50m in marketing/advertising spend to earn 147 new paying customers (340k/customer) seems high Without knowing the ROI it's really impossible to know if this is high or not. Spending $1 to make $2 is always the right decision.
- greggyb 7y ago
  > Spending $1 to make $2 is always the right decision. Unless you have an opportunity to spend $1 and make $3. Your supply of dollar bills is still limited. It's hard to spend huge amounts of money. You've always got to consider where the greatest leverage exists.
onlyrealcuzzo 7y ago
Wait. What? 147 paying customers? I was personally one of those customers, paying like $100 a month, mostly just as a test. They really only added 147 paying customers? How many of them were just paying $100 a month for the base price?
- jacques_chester 7y ago
  It appears to be a misreading. > We had 1,582 customers and 227 enterprise customers as of December 31, 2018. This is an increase of 143, or 10%, in customers and 57, or 33%, in enterprise customers from December 31, 2017. Page 72. The same figure appears again in the table on page 76.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- rajeshp1986 7y ago
  I highly doubt if they counted you as an enterprise customer. Enterprise customers have significantly large multi-year contracts. I have worked in sales org before and we reported only contracts which fetched ~ 100k/year as enterprise customer. 10k to 100k were reported as SMB customers. These numbers may be different for Fastly but I doubt $100/month customers are called Enterprise customers.
  - user5994461 7y ago
    Good luck getting 100k/year contracts in CDN and at a second grade provider. The market has been commoditized by CloudFlare. CloudFlare is charging $200/month for the business plan, or $2000/month for the enterprise plan with everything. There can be banks or government paying 10 times more for custom plans (extensive support and long cycle cycles). These would never adopt Fastly. Akamai can get away with charging millions of dollars to some historic customers who really don't need the service. If they ever migrate away, that's explicitly to take a zero off the bill.
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from_endor 7y ago
147%
brazzledazzle 7y ago
147% not 147 individual customers for anyone else confused.
- jacques_chester 7y ago
  147% appears to be the Dollar-Based Net Expansion rate for the 3 months ending 31st Dec 2017. It drops to 132% by 31st Dec 2018. Still a quite respectable figure.

ec109685 7y ago

Those enterprises are re “-occurring revenue, so I am sure their LTVs are factored in with the spend.

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
Depends. If you don't get the "whole enterprise" the part of the enterprise you got could be easily lost because of a top down "everybody is going to use X" or "why do we have Y different vendors for Z?" type of situations.
- fasteddie 7y ago
  Sure, but that's factored into LTV calculations. If the average customer lasts 5 years before they churn because "Everyone is using X", then you get 5 years of recurring rev off that marketing spend.
merreborn 7y ago
And their biggest enterprise customers are paying fastly at least 6 figures annually

taytus 7y ago

>~$50m in marketing/advertising spend to earn 147 new paying customers (340k/customer) seems high Without knowing the ROI it's really impossible to know if this is high or not. Spending $1 to make $2 is always the right decision.

greggyb 7y ago
> Spending $1 to make $2 is always the right decision. Unless you have an opportunity to spend $1 and make $3. Your supply of dollar bills is still limited. It's hard to spend huge amounts of money. You've always got to consider where the greatest leverage exists.

onlyrealcuzzo 7y ago

Wait. What? 147 paying customers? I was personally one of those customers, paying like $100 a month, mostly just as a test. They really only added 147 paying customers? How many of them were just paying $100 a month for the base price?

jacques_chester 7y ago
It appears to be a misreading. > We had 1,582 customers and 227 enterprise customers as of December 31, 2018. This is an increase of 143, or 10%, in customers and 57, or 33%, in enterprise customers from December 31, 2017. Page 72. The same figure appears again in the table on page 76.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
rajeshp1986 7y ago
I highly doubt if they counted you as an enterprise customer. Enterprise customers have significantly large multi-year contracts. I have worked in sales org before and we reported only contracts which fetched ~ 100k/year as enterprise customer. 10k to 100k were reported as SMB customers. These numbers may be different for Fastly but I doubt $100/month customers are called Enterprise customers.
- user5994461 7y ago
  Good luck getting 100k/year contracts in CDN and at a second grade provider. The market has been commoditized by CloudFlare. CloudFlare is charging $200/month for the business plan, or $2000/month for the enterprise plan with everything. There can be banks or government paying 10 times more for custom plans (extensive support and long cycle cycles). These would never adopt Fastly. Akamai can get away with charging millions of dollars to some historic customers who really don't need the service. If they ever migrate away, that's explicitly to take a zero off the bill.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

from_endor 7y ago

147%

brazzledazzle 7y ago

147% not 147 individual customers for anyone else confused.

jacques_chester 7y ago
147% appears to be the Dollar-Based Net Expansion rate for the 3 months ending 31st Dec 2017. It drops to 132% by 31st Dec 2018. Still a quite respectable figure.