QuinStreet, Inc. (NASDAQ:QNST) Q3 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

So we expect that we will get will return will get back on track. We’ll get back on the ramp. It’s been delayed obviously that’s going to lag a little bit, but we’re excited and we’re as excited as we’ve ever been about that product and what it represents the future for the future of the channel. And we’re super excited to have two big clients beginning their activities again in a pretty earnest way on beginning in June.

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. And sort of building off of the prior question on EBITDA and margins. I’m just wondering if you’re seeing anything in terms of media costs or talent retention that kind of limit some of the flow through versus historical trends?

Doug Valenti: No, not really. It’s again — as I told John it’s really going to depend on the mix that — we’re still fully staffed in our insurance because we want to take full advantage of that. That industry coming back which I indicated was going to give you the numbers on and we’re doing versus others. We are taking full advantage, but we’re only 60% back. And then you’ve got a different mix of different code in the other businesses. So there’s nothing structural or fundamental that would indicate that we’re not going to have all the top line leverage that we would have had historically and that we had you would expect from us.

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. Just the last one for me. Within home services, when you launch a new service availability, is there any sort of like ramp-up like start-up cost of that for reaching sort of like an initial level of profitability? And just how some of those services may differing consumer or customer profile.

Doug Valenti: And it’s a great observation slash question. Yes is the answer. And so we manage that mix pretty carefully. But when you begin to build out a new trade on your initially quite inefficient from a media standpoint because you just don’t have coverage and that’s more the case in home services and is another — our other client verticals because HomeServices is such a fragmented industry. And so we have to be kind of step-by-step build up the client coverage get more media and then get more client coverage and get more media. But it does create some inefficiencies for the period of time where we’re in the ramp because we don’t have full coverage, yes. So that is that’s part of the formula farm. We still do quite well in terms of our media margin and home services.

But it absolutely is the case that when we’re in new trades, they have less media efficiency than the more mature trades. But we manage that and balance that and still maintain very good, strong media margins in home services.

Unidentified Analyst: Okay. Thank you.

Doug Valenti: Thank you.

Operator: Your next question is from the line of Zach Cummins from B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.

Zach Cummins: Hi. Good afternoon. I apologize. I was late joining the call, hopping on from another one. But Doug, could you go into any sort of impact that you saw in the home services vertical in the current quarter? And what are your expectations for what we should be assuming for a sustainable growth rate on that side of the business moving forward?

Doug Valenti: Sure. First of all, last quarter was a record revenue quarter in home services. We expect another record revenue quarter in home services this quarter. We will return once again to double-digit year-over-year growth again this quarter, fiscal Q4. And we will grow home services in the fiscal year, double-digit over last year. So long way of saying we still have the same outlook we’ve always had, which is we think home services gives us a scale and we have the opportunities and the initiatives to grow in double-digits on average. Of course, last quarter was 7% year-over-year in the quarter. For as far as we can see into the future, it is a massive, massive business opportunity. I think we just sliced it again at $69 billion of addressable market.

And we are running now $200 and something million and have a lot of wind at our backs and a lot of demand and a lot of opportunities, really more of making sure we’re focusing on the right things and the right ways at the right time than it is any lack of opportunity or capabilities to deliver against that opportunity. So we love that opportunity. We love that business. We love what we have in terms of product footprint and where we’re going with it. And we think double-digits is the right expectation for many, many years to come.

Zach Cummins: Understood. And just one question for Greg. In terms of free cash flow generation, how should we be thinking about that as you start to hit the up cycle in auto insurance? What’s your typical conversion from adjusted EBITDA to free cash flow? And how are you thinking about putting excess cash to use since your balance sheet is already pretty strong?

Greg Wong: C Yeah, it’s a great question. If you look at it, the general model is the bulk of our adjusted EBITDA, less CapEx drops to free cash flow or normalized free cash flow. As you can see, depending on your working capital and your receivables, we could be, like this quarter, we collected $8.5 million two days after the quarter end, which we typically would have gotten before the quarter. But typically if you look at our adjusted EBITDA, less CapEx is what drops to free cash flow. So if you look at our CapEx right now, it’s going to run anywhere I would say a good model to look at is, $11 to $15 million a year. So that’s kind of how I think about the conversion of EBITDA to cash flow.

Zach Cummins: Understood. Well, thanks for taking my questions and best of luck with the rest of the quarter.

Greg Wong: Thank you, Zach.

Operator: Your next question is from the line of Mark Hagen from Lake Street Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Mark Hagen: Hi. Thank you for taking my question. I’m just kind of curious if you’re seeing any impact on the, let’s call it higher for longer rate environment than some of the other financial services business, call it maybe ex-auto insurance and maybe even home services as well?