Fiverr Earnings Show Strength Of Gig Economy

As the digital-first economy continues to create part-time employment, gig economy platform Fiverr added to its eventful February on Thursday (Feb. 18) by posting earnings that showed substantial growth in revenue as well as active buyers who use the platform to engage freelance services.

“We are very excited about our progress,” Micha Kaufman, founder and CEO of Fiverr told analysts during the company’s earnings call. “We put a lot of attention into the buyer experience as we expand the categories to increase our amount of relevant categories and listings. But we also think there is tremendous growth ahead of us.”

By the numbers, the full-year revenue increased to $190 million, a 77 percent jump over 2019. For Q4 revenue increased 89 percent to $55.9 million, with net loss for the quarter picking up from $7.4 million in 2019 to $8.1 million. Net loss for the full year was $14.8 million, compared to a net loss of $33.5 million in 2019. Fiverr’s active buyers grew 45 percent year over year to 3.4 million. Unlike most companies that have seen significant growth during the pandemic, the company did provide guidance, forecasting revenues in a range of $63 million to $65 million for the first quarter of 2021, a year-on-year growth of 84 percent to 90 percent and of $277 million to $284 million for the full year 2021, a rise of 46 percent to 50 percent compared to full year 2020.

The earnings announcement came amidst a rapid-fire series of announcements and milestones for the company. Arguably the most important from a payments perspective was the subscription model for freelancers, which was announced on Feb. 10. It gives buyers the ability to subscribe to a freelancer’s service, so that they can work with talent on an ongoing basis.

“We haven’t published the exact percentage of categories in which this is relevant,” Kaufman told analysts. “Although that number is sizable, subscriptions, when you think about it, is about a combination of things, such as the convenience of being able to rehire or repurchase the same service, over and over again without any hassle. But it also helps buyers and sellers establish a longer-term relationship. And in some cases, and this is open for sellers for their discretion, they can also combine that the long-term relationship with a discount, as well.”

The call also came on the heels of the company’s controversial Super Bowl ad, which were valued at $5.5 million a pop.

“As a company that’s trying to build a household brand, the Super Bowl is a very important event,” Kaufman said. “It definitely says we have arrived events in terms of brand marketing. And I think that that definitely influences the brand awareness, mostly in the U.S., but it has some halo effect outside of the U.S. as well. Now we’ve invested pretty extensively in brand marketing, including TV campaigns and work on social. But this is also an event that propels our future investments into the brand and creates market awareness, which is extremely important.”

Fiverr announced on Wednesday (Feb. 17) that it was building a new platform to help global corporate brands and agencies to manage teams of part-time workers. And earlier month it acquired a site for creative talent called Working Not Working, in a bid to expand its offering to customers.