Upwork Inc (UPWK) 2024 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Upwork third-quarter 2024 earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions) Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded.

美好的一天，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加 Upwork 2024 年第三季財報電話會議。（操作員指示）請注意，今天的會議正在錄製中。

I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Samuel Meehan, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

現在我想將會議交給今天的發言人、投資者關係副總裁塞繆爾·米漢 (Samuel Meehan)。請繼續。

Thank you. Welcome to Upwork's discussion of its third-quarter 2024 financial results. Joining me today are Hayden Brown, Upwork's President and Chief Executive Officer; and Erica Gessert, Upwork's Chief Financial Officer. Following management's prepared remarks, they will be happy to take your questions. But first, I'll review the safe harbor statement.

謝謝。歡迎參加 Upwork 對其 2024 年第三季財務表現的討論。今天與我一起出席的還有 Upwork 總裁兼執行長 Hayden Brown；以及 Upwork 財務長 Erica Gessert。在管理層準備好發言後，他們將很樂意回答您的問題。但首先，我將回顧安全港聲明。

During the call, we may make statements related to our business that are forward-looking statements under federal securities laws. Forward-looking statements imclude all statements other than statements of historical fact. These statements are not guarantees of future performance but rather are subject to a variety of risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Our actual results could differ materially from expectations reflected in any forward-looking statements.

在電話會議期間，我們可能會根據聯邦證券法發表與我們業務相關的前瞻性聲明。前瞻性陳述包括除歷史事實陳述之外的所有陳述。這些陳述並不是對未來績效的保證，而是受到各種風險、不確定性和假設的影響。我們的實際結果可能與任何前瞻性陳述中反映的預期有重大差異。

For a discussion of the material risks and other important factors that could affect our actual results, please refer to our SEC filings available on the SEC website and on our Investor Relations website as well as the risks and other important factors discussed in today's earnings press release. Additional information will be set forth in our quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the three months ended September 30, 2024.

有關可能影響我們實際業績的重大風險和其他重要因素的討論，請參閱 SEC 網站和投資者關係網站上提供的 SEC 文件，以及今天的收益新聞稿中討論的風險和其他重要因素。更多資訊將在我們截至 2024 年 9 月 30 日的三個月的 10-Q 季報告中列出。

In addition, reference will be made to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Information regarding non-GAAP financial measures, including reconciliations to their most directly comparable GAAP financial measures can be found in the press release that was issued this afternoon on our Investor Relations website at investors.upwork.com.

此外，也將參考某些非公認會計準則財務指標。有關非 GAAP 財務指標的信息，包括與其最直接可比較的 GAAP 財務指標的調整表，請參閱今天下午在我們的投資者關係網站 Investors.upwork.com 上發布的新聞稿。

Unless otherwise noted, reported figures are rounded in comparisons of the third quarter of 2024 or to the third quarter of 2023. Adjusted EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA margin and free cash flow are non-GAAP financial measures, and all other financial measures are GAAP, unless cited as non-GAAP.

除非另有說明，報告的數據是在 2024 年第三季或與 2023 年第三季的比較中進行四捨五入的。調整後 EBITDA、調整後 EBITDA 利潤率和自由現金流量均為非 GAAP 財務指標，所有其他財務指標均為 GAAP，除非被列為非 GAAP。

Now I'll turn the call over to Hayden.

現在我將把電話轉給海登。

Welcome, everyone, to Upwork's third-quarter 2024 earnings call. Upwork continues to deliver durable, profitable growth as we execute our long-term strategy to drive revenue and margin expansion even amid a challenging and dynamic macro environment. Third quarter revenue grew 10% year over year to $193.8 million as we saw a slight top-of-funnel improvements, momentum in managed services, an all-time high in take rate, and continued growth from our ads and monetization products.

歡迎大家參加 Upwork 的 2024 年第三季財報電話會議。即使在充滿挑戰和動態的宏觀環境中，我們也執行推動營收和利潤成長的長期策略，Upwork 繼續實現持久的獲利成長。第三季營收年增 10%，達到 1.938 億美元，因為我們看到漏斗頂部略有改善、託管服務的勢頭、歷史最高的接受率以及我們的廣告和貨幣化產品的持續增長。

Our third-quarter net income of $27.8 million and adjusted EBITDA of $43.2 million, both record highs, demonstrate our steadfast commitment to enhancing profitability. Simultaneously, we are rapidly innovating, especially in AI and activating our levers to catalyze GSV and revenue growth.

我們的第三季淨利潤為 2,780 萬美元，調整後 EBITDA 為 4,320 萬美元，均創歷史新高，這表明我們對提高獲利能力的堅定承諾。同時，我們正在快速創新，特別是在人工智慧方面，並啟動我們的槓桿來促進 GSV 和收入成長。

Together, all of these initiatives ultimately deliver greater shareholder value. The organizational changes announced on October 23 are part of our ongoing efficiency efforts, allowing us to execute more effectively while generating an expected $60 million in annualized cost savings. These changes enable us to continue leaning into our strengths, moving more nimbly and further innovate to deliver for our customers.

所有這些舉措最終共同帶來更大的股東價值。10 月 23 日宣布的組織變革是我們持續提高效率努力的一部分，使我們能夠更有效地執行，同時預計每年節省 6000 萬美元的成本。這些變化使我們能夠繼續發揮我們的優勢，更加靈活、進一步創新，為客戶提供服務。

We're assembling smaller, more streamlined teams that can move faster towards our goals. We're focused on a narrower portfolio of high ROI and high potential R&D investments, and we're implementing more automation and third-party vendor solutions across the business. So our own teams can put all of their energy into excelling at what we do best.

我們正在組建更小、更精簡的團隊，以便更快地實現我們的目標。我們專注於高投資回報率和高潛力研發投資的更狹窄的投資組合，並且我們正在整個業務中實施更多的自動化和第三方供應商解決方案。因此，我們自己的團隊可以將所有精力投入到我們最擅長的領域。

In enterprise, we used learnings from the last few quarters to sharpen our strategy. We've presented a leaner, more effective sales and support team against our largest, highest ROI clients, immediately improving profitability in this business unit while still enabling our smaller enterprise clients to succeed with a lighter touch approach.

在企業方面，我們利用過去幾季的經驗教訓來完善我們的策略。我們針對規模最大、投資回報率最高的客戶打造了一支更精簡、更有效率的銷售和支援團隊，立即提高了該業務部門的盈利能力，同時仍然使我們的小型企業客戶能夠透過更輕鬆的接觸方式取得成功。

The launch of Upwork Business Plus on October 16 lets us serve larger clients with a plan that meets their needs by being more fully featured than our marketplace offering, but with a higher take rate. At the same time, acquisition costs and cost to serve are significantly lower than with our enterprise offering.

Upwork Business Plus 於 10 月 16 日推出，使我們能夠為更大的客戶提供比我們的市場產品功能更全面、但採用率更高的計劃來滿足他們的需求。同時，購置成本和服務成本顯著低於我們的企業產品。

Business Plus enables clients to grow and expand share of wallet with Upwork through a smoother glide path that further closes the gap between our current marketplace and enterprise offerings. We're already achieving solid traction via Business Plus with hundreds of clients organically enrolling in the new plan since its launch.

Business Plus 使客戶能夠透過更順暢的滑行路徑來增加和擴大 Upwork 的錢包份額，從而進一步縮小我們當前市場和企業產品之間的差距。自從新計劃推出以來，我們已經透過 Business Plus 獲得了堅實的吸引力，數百名客戶有機地加入了該計劃。

In the third quarter, we signed 42 enterprise deals through a combination of our traditional enterprise plans and a continuation of the testing from last quarter. We welcomed Hunter Douglas, Bill.com, Berlitz, and Guess as new enterprise clients.

第三季度，我們透過傳統的企業計畫和上季測試的延續，簽署了42筆企業交易。我們歡迎 Hunter Douglas、Bill.com、Berlitz 和 Guess 作為新的企業客戶。

Based on the success of our testing, we recently shifted our land sales team's focus, selling Business Plus and managed services. We are confident that this refreshed go-to-market strategy and our rightsized investment to deliver higher ROI for customers and shareholders will allow us to more effectively capitalize on the enterprise opportunity. We are steadfast in our commitment to serving the enterprise market and believe Upwork has the right model to unlock a very large enterprise TAM.

基於我們測試的成功，我們最近將土地銷售團隊的重點轉移到銷售 Business Plus 和託管服務。我們相信，這項更新的上市策略和我們為客戶和股東帶來更高投資回報率而進行的合理投資將使我們能夠更有效地利用企業機會。我們堅定不移地致力於服務企業市場，並相信 Upwork 擁有釋放超大型企業 TAM 的正確模式。

Our account management teams will continue to support our existing installed base of hundreds of enterprise customers whose selection of Upwork is a result of our unique value proposition and product offerings.

我們的客戶管理團隊將繼續為我們現有的數百家企業客戶提供支持，他們選擇 Upwork 是因為我們獨特的價值主張和產品。

Execution of this strategy is being overseen by Ernesto Lamaina, our GM of Enterprise. Ernesto has already logged major successes over his past year at Upwork and brings deep experience building enterprise products and leading digitally-enabled businesses within traditional staffing providers.

此策略的執行由我們的企業總經理 Ernesto Lamaina 負責監督。Ernesto 在過去的一年中已經在 Upwork 取得了重大成功，並帶來了在傳統人力資源提供者中建立企業產品和領導數位化業務的豐富經驗。

These operational changes support our strategic plans to create shareholder value alongside our execution on key GSV and revenue growth levers that include: one, making Upwork the preeminent destination for AI talent and work; two, improving customer productivity and accelerating work outcomes with AI-powered features and experiences both on Uma, Upwork's Mindful AI; three, continued expansion into our enterprise TAM which we've already touched on today; four, acquiring new clients cost-effectively and at scale through partnerships; five, continuing to drive marketplace quality, efficiency and take rate expansion via our ads and monetization efforts.

這些營運變化支持我們的策略計劃，以創造股東價值，同時執行關鍵的 GSV 和收入成長槓桿，其中包括：第一，使 Upwork 成為人工智慧人才和工作的卓越目的地；第二，透過 Upwork 的 Mindful AI Uma 上的人工智慧功能和體驗提高客戶生產力並加快工作成果；三、繼續擴展我們今天已經談到的企業TAM；第四，透過合作夥伴關係以具成本效益且規模化的方式獲取新客戶；第五，透過我們的廣告和貨幣化努力，持續提高市場品質、效率和利用率擴張。

Progress on these levers was notable in Q3, as showcased in our semiannual Upwork Updates product release on October 16.

正如我們在 10 月 16 日發布的半年度 Upwork 更新產品所展示的那樣，這些手段在第三季度取得了顯著的進展。

First, AI continues to be a tailwind for our business with GSV from AI-related work growing 36% year over year in the third quarter, even as we lap quarters of very pronounced growth in this type of work. In parallel, a number of clients engaging in AI-related projects on the Upwork platform grew 30% year over year in the quarter.

首先，人工智慧仍然是我們與 GSV 業務的推動力，第三季度人工智慧相關工作同比增長 36%，儘管我們在此類工作中經歷了幾個季度的非常明顯的增長。同時，本季在Upwork平台上從事人工智慧相關專案的客戶數量較去年同期成長30%。

Second, we are continuing to make rapid progress along our AI road map by infusing Uma, our Mindful AI, with advanced features that improve our customers' productivity. We unveiled new capabilities for Uma as a powerful work companion that helps customers brainstorm work ideas and solutions, analyze problems, write content, code for projects and more, all enhanced by rich historical signals from the Upwork platform.

其次，我們透過為我們的 Mindful AI Uma 注入可提高客戶生產力的先進功能，繼續沿著我們的 AI 路線圖取得快速進展。我們為 Uma 推出了新功能，作為強大的工作伴侶，幫助客戶集思廣益工作想法和解決方案、分析問題、編寫內容、專案程式碼等，所有這些都透過 Upwork 平台的豐富歷史訊號得到增強。

To improve speed and quality of matching between clients and talent, Uma can now create tailored proposal drafts for freelancers and evaluate candidates for clients based on how closely professional skills and experience fit their job post. These features are gaining popularity of customers and will amplify matching performance with our corresponding metrics like fill rate already being at an all-time high.

為了提高客戶和人才之間匹配的速度和質量，Uma 現在可以為自由工作者創建量身定制的提案草案，並根據專業技能和經驗與職位的匹配程度來評估客戶的候選人。這些功能越來越受到客戶的歡迎，並將透過我們相應的指標（例如已經處於歷史最高水平的填充率）來增強匹配性能。

Additionally, to expedite our progress in delivering on-demand work outcomes to larger clients, our managed services teams are now utilizing Uma as a competitive advantage. A key accelerant to our AI strategy is in our successful acquisition integration of Headroom, which enabled us to deepen our talent bench and increased velocity of our AI road map, including the launch and advancement of Uma.

此外，為了加快向大客戶提供按需工作成果的進程，我們的託管服務團隊現在正在利用 Uma 作為競爭優勢。我們人工智慧策略的一個關鍵促進因素是我們成功收購了 Headroom，這使我們能夠深化我們的人才庫並提高人工智慧路線圖的速度，包括 Uma 的推出和進步。

Today, we are thrilled to announce the next step on that AI road map as we've entered a definitive agreement to acquire Objective, an AI-native search as a service company. Objective's multimodal search technology will be another accelerant to our core search and match performance. as well as Uma's capabilities associated with images, video and audio content.

今天，我們很高興地宣佈人工智慧路線圖的下一步，我們已達成收購 Objective（一家人工智慧原生搜尋即服務公司）的最終協議。Objective 的多模式搜尋技術將成為我們核心搜尋和匹配效能的另一個促進劑。以及 Uma 與圖像、視訊和音訊內容相關的功能。

The Objective team will provide further depth for the import AI and machine learning group. These small focused acquisitions are aimed at advancing our AI strategy, and we have a strong track record of integrating them to elevate our AI offerings and talent density. We anticipate the transaction will close in the coming weeks and are eager to welcome the Objective team to Upwork.

Objective 團隊將為導入人工智慧和機器學習小組提供進一步的深度。這些小型集中收購旨在推動我們的人工智慧策略，我們在整合這些收購以提升我們的人工智慧產品和人才密度方面擁有良好的記錄。我們預計交易將在未來幾週內完成，並熱切歡迎 Objective 團隊加入 Upwork。

Next, we've continued pursuing our strategy to acquire new clients, cost-effectively and at scale through partnerships. We've introduced the ability for third-party tech providers to offer fully managed projects delivered by Upwork, embedded directly within their own checkout or platform experiences.

接下來，我們繼續推行我們的策略，透過合作夥伴關係，以經濟高效的方式大規模地獲取新客戶。我們引入了第三方技術提供者能夠提供由 Upwork 交付的完全託管專案的能力，這些專案直接嵌入到他們自己的結帳或平台體驗中。

In early proof-of-concept partnerships, emergent tech providers like Lettuce and Ocoya are now offering project outcomes within their own customer workflows, delivered through AI-powered Upwork managed services, supported by proven talent from our platform.

在早期的概念驗證合作夥伴關係中，Lettuce 和 Ocoya 等新興技術提供者現在在自己的客戶工作流程中提供專案成果，透過人工智慧驅動的 Upwork 託管服務交付，並得到我們平台成熟人才的支持。

We also expanded our Upwork Partner Experts program, so that clients can find the exact expertise they need more easily on Upwork, now partnering with Webflow, Smartsheet, Bubble, and others to supply pre-vetted experts in their technologies.

我們還擴大了 Upwork 合作夥伴專家計劃，以便客戶可以在 Upwork 上更輕鬆地找到他們所需的確切專業知識，現在與 Webflow、Smartsheet、Bubble 等合作，提供預先審查的技術專家。

Finally, we continue to drive marketplace quality, efficiency and take rate expansion via our ads and monetization products, which continue to be one of our fastest-growing revenue streams, increasing 35% year over year during the quarter.

最後，我們繼續透過廣告和貨幣化產品推動市場品質、效率和轉換率擴張，這仍然是我們成長最快的收入來源之一，本季年增 35%。

In Q3, we introduced a new ad product, featured jobs, that are likely to be seen by more candidates and connect clients with the talent they need more efficiently. Other ads and monetization enhancements included expanding Boosted Profiles to appear more prominently in search results, giving high-intent freelancers a better likelihood of getting selected by clients for a project.

在第三季度，我們推出了一個新的廣告產品，即特色職位，它可能會被更多候選人看到，並更有效地將客戶與他們需要的人才聯繫起來。其他廣告和貨幣化增強功能包括擴展“Boosted Profiles”，使其在搜尋結果中更加突出，使高意圖的自由工作者更有可能被客戶選擇參與專案。

Our organizational changes for proactive cost discipline and our pace of innovation that fuels our GSV and revenue growth levers continue to fortify Upwork, illustrated by our ongoing market share gains and outperformance of industry peers.

我們為積極主動的成本控製而進行的組織變革，以及推動 GSV 和收入成長槓桿的創新步伐，繼續強化 Upwork，這從我們持續的市場份額增長和優於行業同行的表現就可以看出。

Thanks to our customers and team, even against the backdrop of undeniably challenging market conditions impacting small and large businesses alike, we grew revenue 17% year over year during the first half of 2024, whereas revenue declined an average of 8% year over year across the broader staffing industry.

感謝我們的客戶和團隊，即使在影響小型和大型企業的不可否認的充滿挑戰的市場環境的背景下，我們在2024 年上半年的收入仍同比增長17%，而全年收入平均同比下降8 %更廣泛的人力資源產業。

We have made strong steady progress along a clear path to durable, profitable growth and driven unrivaled scale while continuing to invest in a focused and impactful innovation agenda. As ever, we remain relentlessly committed to delivering for our customers and delivering shareholder value through increasing profitability and free cash flow, alongside strategic capital allocation. The resiliency of this business and its enduring potential for value creation are proven.

我們在實現持久、獲利成長的明確道路上取得了強勁而穩定的進展，並推動了無與倫比的規模，同時繼續投資於有針對性和有影響力的創新議程。一如既往，我們仍然堅持不懈地致力於透過提高獲利能力和自由現金流以及策略資本配置來為客戶提供服務並提供股東價值。該業務的彈性及其持久的價值創造潛力已得到證明。

We look forward to continuing to unlock the immense potential of Upwork over the short, medium and long term for all of our stakeholders.

我們期待繼續為所有利害關係人釋放 Upwork 在短期、中期和長期的巨大潛力。

With that, I will turn it over to Erica to review our financials.

這樣，我將把它交給艾麗卡來審查我們的財務狀況。

Thanks, Hayden. The strength of our business is impressive in the current challenging macro environment. The third quarter was one of rapid execution at Upwork, in which we made strong progress across every area of our business. We continue to gain market share and generate increasing profitability and top-line growth. Margins reached all-time highs in the third quarter with our gross margin increasing to 78% and our adjusted EBITDA margin to 22%.

謝謝，海登。在當前充滿挑戰的宏觀環境中，我們的業務實力令人印象深刻。第三季度是 Upwork 執行速度最快的季度，我們在各個業務領域都取得了強勁進展。我們不斷獲得市場份額，並持續提高獲利能力和營收成長。第三季的利潤率達到歷史新高，毛利率增加至 78%，調整後 EBITDA 利潤率增加至 22%。

We are demonstrating continued progress toward our goal of 35% adjusted EBITDA margin in the next five years, while increasing our operating leverage every year along the way. The organizational changes we announced on October 23 will align our operating model with our ambitions for accelerated execution and margin expansion. These actions resulted in a company-wide 21% reduction in head count and an expected $60 million in annualized cost savings.

我們正在向未來五年調整後 EBITDA 利潤率達到 35% 的目標不斷取得進展，同時我們的營運槓桿每年都會增加。我們在 10 月 23 日宣布的組織變革將使我們的營運模式與我們加速執行和利潤擴張的目標保持一致。這些行動導致全公司員工人數減少了 21%，預計每年可節省 6,000 萬美元的成本。

Now I'll review a few highlights from our third quarter results. Revenue grew 10% year over year to $193.8 million in the quarter, significantly above our previous guidance. This overperformance was driven by slight top of funnel improvements, momentum in managed services and continued growth from our ads products. Marketplace revenue was $167.3 million, a 12% increase compared to $149.6 million in the third quarter last year. In our enterprise business, total enterprise revenue grew slightly at $26.4 million in Q3.

現在我將回顧第三季業績的一些亮點。本季營收年增 10% 至 1.938 億美元，顯著高於我們先前的指引。這種超額表現是由漏斗頂部的輕微改進、託管服務的勢頭以及我們廣告產品的持續增長所推動的。市場營收為 1.673 億美元，比去年第三季的 1.496 億美元成長 12%。在我們的企業業務中，第三季企業總收入略有成長，達到 2,640 萬美元。

We remain very confident in the huge opportunity in enterprise. We will continue to report enterprise revenue separately, even as we serve more of our enterprise customers through our Business Plus plan, which will be recognized in the marketplace revenue line going forward.

我們對企業的巨大機會仍然充滿信心。我們將繼續單獨報告企業收入，即使我們透過 Business Plus 計劃為更多的企業客戶提供服務，這將在未來的市場收入中得到認可。

Given changes to our approach, our traditional enterprise plan deal number will decline as the year progresses. And as we close out our existing pipeline, meaning our prior new enterprise logo metric will be less relevant after Q4.

鑑於我們方法的改變，我們傳統的企業計劃交易數量將隨著時間的推移而下降。隨著我們關閉現有管道，這意味著我們之前的新企業徽標指標在第四季度之後將不再那麼重要。

Managed Services revenue showed strength in the third quarter, growing 5% on a year-over-year basis, reflecting steady demand for outcome-based delivery of work and our focus on expanding share of wallet among our largest enterprise clients. We continue to grow our managed services land funnel and signed an increasing number of managed services MSAs in the quarter.

第三季託管服務收入表現強勁，年增 5%，反映出對基於結果的工作交付的穩定需求以及我們致力於擴大最大企業客戶的錢包份額。我們繼續擴大我們的託管服務土地漏斗，並在本季度簽署了越來越多的託管服務管理協議。

Our overall active client base grew 2% year over year to 855,000 with both new acquisition and retention benefiting us. Our GSV per active client increased in the third quarter versus the second quarter as our value proposition continues to resonate with customers, even in a period of tighter budgets. In Q3, we also saw average GSV per client increase over Q2 in all business segments, from enterprises to very small businesses.

我們的整體活躍客戶群年增 2%，達到 855,000 名，新客戶的獲取和保留都使我們受益。我們的每個活躍客戶的 GSV 與第二季度相比在第三季度有所增加，因為我們的價值主張繼續與客戶產生共鳴，即使在預算緊張的時期也是如此。在第三季度，我們還看到從企業到小型企業的所有業務部門的每個客戶平均 GSV 都比第二季度增加。

Our marketplace take rate continued to reach record highs at 18.3% in Q3, increasing 30 basis points from Q2, driven by continued growth in our ads and monetization business. While we have implemented significant pricing and monetization measures to optimize take rate over the past few years, in coming quarters, we will take a more surgical approach, resulting in a more measured pace of take rate expansion. Introducing new and innovative ways to bring value to our customers catalyzes activity in our marketplace, and we expect these to be the drivers of take rate over the next few quarters as opposed to wholesale pricing changes.

在廣告和貨幣化業務持續成長的推動下，我們的市佔率在第三季繼續創下 18.3% 的歷史新高，較第二季增加 30 個基點。雖然我們在過去幾年中實施了重大的定價和貨幣化措施來優化採用率，但在未來幾個季度，我們將採取更嚴格的方法，從而更加謹慎地提高採用率擴張的速度。引入新的和創新的方式為我們的客戶帶來價值會促進我們市場的活動，我們預計這些將成為未來幾個季度的採用率驅動因素，而不是批發價格的變化。

Non-GAAP gross margin continued to improve, both on a year over year and sequential basis to 77.8% as we executed disciplined cost management across every area of our business. Non-GAAP operating expense was $110.8 million, representing 57% of revenue in Q3 2024 compared to 59% of revenue in the prior year period.

由於我們在業務的各個領域都執行嚴格的成本管理，非 GAAP 毛利率持續改善，年比和季比均達到 77.8%。非 GAAP 營運費用為 1.108 億美元，佔 2024 年第三季營收的 57%，去年同期為 59%。

For the third quarter, non-GAAP R&D expense was $42.0 million. We expect non-GAAP R&D expense, excluding onetime charges to decline by low single digits on a percentage basis sequentially in the fourth quarter. Non-GAAP sales and marketing expense was $42.9 million, and it declined 3% year over year, and we expect spend to decline in the fourth quarter by an even greater magnitude on a percentage basis compared to the third quarter.

第三季度，非 GAAP 研發費用為 4,200 萬美元。我們預計第四季非公認會計準則研發費用（不包括一次性費用）將按百分比下降較低的個位數。非 GAAP 銷售和行銷費用為 4,290 萬美元，年減 3%，我們預計第四季的支出下降幅度將比第三季更大。

Our provision for transaction losses remain low at $1.8 million for Q3, approximately 1% of total revenue. Adjusted EBITDA was $43.2 million in the quarter, representing adjusted EBITDA margin of 22.3%. Our profitable business model generated our highest quarter of GAAP net income ever and continue to generate GAAP earnings per share growth, which includes the impact of stock-based compensation. For the third quarter of 2024, GAAP net income was $27.8 million, and fully diluted GAAP earnings per share was $0.20.

第三季我們的交易損失撥備仍維持在 180 萬美元的低水平，約佔總收入的 1%。本季調整後 EBITDA 為 4,320 萬美元，調整後 EBITDA 利潤率為 22.3%。我們的獲利業務模式創造了有史以來最高的 GAAP 淨利潤，並繼續實現 GAAP 每股盈餘成長，其中包括基於股票的薪酬的影響。2024 年第三季度，GAAP 淨利為 2,780 萬美元，完全稀釋後的 GAAP 每股收益為 0.20 美元。

The free cash flow for the third quarter was $98 million, which benefited from the weekly timing of payments to customer accounts. Excluding this favorable timing impact, we estimate our free cash flow in the quarter would have been approximately $52 million which is a 58% year-over-year increase.

第三季的自由現金流為 9,800 萬美元，這得益於每周向客戶帳戶付款的時間。排除這一有利的時間影響，我們估計本季的自由現金流約為 5,200 萬美元，年增 58%。

Cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities were approximately $601 million at the end of the third quarter. Following the completion of our previous $100 million share repurchase program earlier this year, we are pleased to announce a new $100 million share repurchase authorization.

截至第三季末，現金、現金等價物和有價證券約為 6.01 億美元。繼今年稍早完成之前的 1 億美元股票回購計畫後，我們很高興地宣布一項新的 1 億美元股票回購授權。

We remain committed to executing our long-term strategy, and we'll utilize our healthy balance sheet and strong cash generation to deliver shareholder value, including making the right investments in our growth levers, evaluating accretive M&A and opportunistically deploying capital to repurchase shares.

我們仍然致力於執行我們的長期策略，我們將利用我們健康的資產負債表和強大的現金產生能力來創造股東價值，包括對我們的成長槓桿進行正確的投資，評估增值併購以及機會性地部署資本來回購股票。

Turning to guidance. We are increasing our fourth quarter revenue and adjusted EBITDA outlook based on a continuation of the trends we saw in the third quarter. For the fourth quarter of 2024, we expect to produce revenue in the range of $178 million to $183 million.

轉向指導。我們正在增加第四季度的收入，並根據第三季趨勢的延續調整 EBITDA 前景。2024 年第四季度，我們預計營收將在 1.78 億美元至 1.83 億美元之間。

For adjusted EBITDA in the fourth quarter, we are guiding to a range of $38 million to $42 million, which represents an adjusted EBITDA margin of 22% at the midpoint. We expect the majority of the cost benefits driven by our recently announced organizational changes to materialize in 2025.

對於第四季度調整後的 EBITDA，我們的指引範圍為 3,800 萬美元至 4,200 萬美元，這意味著調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率為中點 22%。我們預計最近宣布的組織變革所帶來的大部分成本效益將在 2025 年實現。

For the full year 2024, we anticipate revenue between $756 million and $761 million, representing 10% year-over-year growth at the midpoint. We expect our take rate for the rest of the year to be down slightly from what we saw in Q3. As a result of our ongoing cost discipline and the strength of our business model, we are increasing our adjusted EBITDA margin outlook and now expect our full-year adjusted EBITDA will be in the range of $155 million to $159 million.

對於 2024 年全年，我們預計營收在 7.56 億美元至 7.61 億美元之間，中間值年增 10%。我們預計今年剩餘時間的使用率將比第三季略有下降。由於我們持續的成本紀律和業務模式的優勢，我們正在提高調整後 EBITDA 利潤率預期，目前預計全年調整後 EBITDA 將在 1.55 億美元至 1.59 億美元之間。

As a reminder, GSV and revenue growth and consequently, adjusted EBITDA margin, are affected in the fourth quarter of this year by the fact that there are fewer Sundays in the quarter this year versus last year. Because of the timing each week when our clients are billed, the number of Sundays in any set period affects our revenue and GSV recognition in that period.

提醒一下，今年第四季的 GSV 和收入成長以及調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率都受到了影響，因為今年該季度的周日數量比去年少。由於每周向我們的客戶計費的時間，任何設定期間內的星期日數量都會影響我們在該期間的收入和 GSV 認可。

Excluding the structural impact, we estimate our GSV and revenue growth rates for the fourth quarter would be approximately 4 percentage points higher year over year. We expect full-year 2024 non-GAAP diluted EPS to be between $1 and $1.02, up from our guidance last quarter of $0.90 to $0.94.

排除結構性影響，我們預期第四季的 GSV 和營收成長率將年增約 4 個百分點。我們預計 2024 年全年非 GAAP 攤薄後每股收益將在 1 美元至 1.02 美元之間，高於我們上季度指引的 0.90 美元至 0.94 美元。

For the full year, we expect weighted average shares outstanding between 139 million to 141 million. We are also providing an update to our stock-based compensation expense guidance for the year. Our prior guidance was that SBC expense would average a little under $20 million per quarter in 2024.

我們預計全年加權平均流通股數將介於 1.39 億股至 1.41 億股之間。我們還提供了今年基於股票的薪酬費用指南的更新。我們先前的指導意見是，到 2024 年，SBC 費用平均每季略低於 2,000 萬美元。

We are tracking below that guidance in our projection for Q4 due to our long-term strategy regarding team structure and operating approach that balances stock-based compensation with cash-based compensation. We expect stock-based compensation to continue to trend down into 2025. These efforts, along with our ongoing cost discipline and active capital return reflect our clear and unrelenting focus on building shareholder value over the near and long term.

由於我們關於團隊結構和平衡股票薪酬與現金薪酬的營運方法的長期策略，我們對第四季度的預測低於該指引。我們預期股票薪酬將在 2025 年繼續呈下降趨勢。這些努力，加上我們持續的成本控制和積極的資本回報，反映了我們對在近期和長期建立股東價值的明確和不懈的關注。

Finally, as we have discussed for some time now, the macro environment continues to be challenging. New tech jobs continue to hover at a nearly three-year low, and inflationary and interest rate pressures continue to affect corporate spending across all business segments. We expect that it will take some time for these broader macro factors to improve and spending behavior to shift.

最後，正如我們已經討論了一段時間的那樣，宏觀環境仍然充滿挑戰。新技術職位繼續徘徊在近三年來的低點，通膨和利率壓力繼續影響所有業務部門的企業支出。我們預計這些更廣泛的宏觀因素需要一段時間才能改善並改變支出行為。

Our ability to deliver strong growth over a multiyear period of volatility and suppressed demand is a testament to our focus on operational excellence and our highly attractive value proposition. However, we're not immune to the environment we operate in. And as we expect macro pressures to continue as we enter 2025, we are cautious about our top line growth over the next few quarters.

我們有能力在多年的波動和需求抑制下實現強勁成長，證明了我們對卓越營運的關注和極具吸引力的價值主張。然而，我們並不能免於我們所處環境的影響。由於我們預計進入 2025 年宏觀壓力將持續，因此我們對未來幾季的營收成長持謹慎態度。

Within this environment, we will continue our focus on durable profitable growth, our investment in new growth vectors like the advancement of AI on our platform and our commitment to driving shareholder value through capital return as we expand our margins and free cash flow. As always, I want to close by thanking our incredible team at Upwork for their contributions this quarter and their unparalleled creativity, focus and pace of execution.

在這種環境下，我們將繼續專注於持久的獲利成長，對新成長載體的投資，例如我們平台上人工智慧的進步，以及我們在擴大利潤和自由現金流的同時，透過資本回報推動股東價值的承諾。像往常一樣，我想最後感謝 Upwork 令人難以置信的團隊在本季度做出的貢獻以及無與倫比的創造力、專注力和執行速度。

With that, we would be happy to take your questions.

因此，我們很樂意回答您的問題。

(Operator Instructions) Ronald Josey, Citi.

（操作員指令）Ronald Josey，花旗銀行。

Hey. Thanks so much. This is Jake on for Ron. So really, the first question I wanted to ask was around 4Q guidance. So we talked about the improving trends in September and then the guidance implies a continuation of those positive trends through year-end. Could you maybe spend a moment just on what -- is that like assuming that those improving trends continue throughout the quarter? Maybe just help us understand, I know you talked about it a little bit, but what are the key factors that are going to drive GSV to reaccelerate?

嘿。非常感謝。這是傑克為榮恩代言的。事實上，我想問的第一個問題是關於第四季的指導。因此，我們討論了 9 月的改善趨勢，然後指導意味著這些積極趨勢將持續到年底。您能否花點時間思考一下—假設這些改善趨勢在整個季度持續下去？也許只是幫助我們理解，我知道你談過一點，但推動 GSV 重新加速的關鍵因素是什麼？

And then second, really wanted to double-click on the new surfaces for freelancers to promote their listings. You've talked about a few in the prepared remarks, but given that, that could be the key driver of take rates going forward, just wanted to better understand the additional services and key products that you expect to help drive those take rates going forward. Thanks so much.

其次，我真的很想雙擊新的介面，讓自由工作者宣傳他們的名單。您在準備好的演講中談到了一些內容，但考慮到這可能是未來轉換率的關鍵驅動因素，只是想更好地了解您希望幫助推動未來轉換率的附加服務和關鍵產品。非常感謝。

Yeah, sure. Maybe I'll take -- this is Erica, I'll take the question on guidance and then maybe hand it to Hayden to talk about the freelancer services. So on the Q4 guidance, we did see really starting in late August and into September, some improvements in our top of funnel trends versus what we experienced in June and July.

是的，當然。也許我會——這是埃麗卡，我會回答有關指導的問題，然後可能會將其交給海登談論自由職業者服務。因此，在第四季度的指導中，我們確實看到從 8 月下旬到 9 月開始，我們的漏斗頂部趨勢與 6 月和 7 月經歷的情況相比有了一些改善。

I do want to emphasize though that some of the topical trends, including work and contract starts are still negative on a year-over-year basis. And so that's also in the guidance, as you can see, we do -- we are still forecasting negative year-over-year GSV growth in Q4.

但我確實想強調的是，一些熱門趨勢，包括工作和合約開始時間，與去年同期相比仍然是負面的。正如您所看到的，我們仍然預測第四季度 GSV 年比負成長。

So I think while we have seen some improvement in the trends and those are positive signs. I think that we are, as I talked about, we are still quite cautious on the macro environment and think that we've seen a lot of volatility in the trends and we're not ready to call it a trend now.

因此，我認為雖然我們已經看到趨勢有所改善，但這些都是積極的跡象。我認為，正如我所說，我們對宏觀環境仍然相當謹慎，並且認為我們已經看到了趨勢的巨大波動，我們現在還沒有準備好將其稱為趨勢。

So incorporated at for the Q4 forecast, there's not an upswing in GSV trends overall, but really more of a steady state to what we saw going into October, which is consistent with the relationship between September and October have worked.

因此，考慮到第四季度的預測，GSV 趨勢總體上並沒有上升，但實際上與我們在10 月看到的情況相比處於穩定狀態，這與9 月和10 月之間的關係是一致的。

Jake, on the topic of how freelancers can some of their offerings and how that relates to our take rate outlook today on Upwork, there's a few ways that they can do this. So we have Boosted Profiles and Boosted Proposals as two ways that they can really make themselves more visible on the platform.

Jake，關於自由工作者如何提供他們的一些產品以及這與我們今天在 Upwork 上的接受率展望有何關係，他們可以透過幾種方法來做到這一點。因此，我們提供了「提升個人資料」和「提升提案」這兩種方式，讓他們能夠真正讓自己在平台上更加引人注目。

And we also monetize on the freelancer side through freelancer plus, which is the subscription plan for freelancers as well as connect purchases, which is the way that they buy bundles of connect in order to bid on generally available jobs in ecosystem.

我們還透過 freelancer plus 在自由工作者方面實現盈利，這是自由工作者的訂閱計劃以及連接購買，這是他們購買連接捆綁包以競標生態系統中普遍可用的工作的方式。

So there's basically four levers on the freelancer side there. These are generally not newly launched features in the last quarter, but we have been expanding and enhancing some of the ways that this these are just visible. So for example, Boosted Profiles is the one we mentioned earlier, which is now more prominent, more visible into results as an example.

所以自由工作者方面基本上有四個槓桿。這些通常不是上個季度新推出的功能，但我們一直在擴展和增強一些使這些功能可見的方式。例如，Boosted Profiles 就是我們之前提到的，現在它更加突出，在結果中更加明顯。

As is really to your question about take rate, our view is that we are continuing to be very specific and surgical in making sure that these types of enhancements are super beneficial to the entire system as they have been to date. And as we mentioned, these are places where take rate will have maybe modest increases going forward, but we're not making wholesale pricing changes in the ecosystem that would drive substantial increases in take rate.

正如您關於採取率的問題一樣，我們的觀點是，我們將繼續非常具體和外科手術，以確保這些類型的增強功能對整個系統非常有益，就像迄今為止一樣。正如我們所提到的，在這些地方，未來的使用率可能會略有增加，但我們不會在生態系統中進行批發定價改變，從而推動使用率大幅增加。

And we're really pleased with the increase we've had already. I mean it's been notable the traction increases in take rate you've seen over the last year, 1.5 years with us. But going forward, you're not going to see that type of major increases in take rate because we've done a lot of work here and we're going to do so but in a more surgical way.

我們對已經實現的成長感到非常滿意。我的意思是，在過去的 1.5 年裡，您在我們這裡看到的採用率的成長是值得注意的。但展望未來，你不會看到採用率出現這種大幅增長，因為我們已經在這裡做了很多工作，而且我們將以更外科手術的方式這樣做。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Andrew Boone, JMP Securities.

安德魯·布恩，JMP 證券。

Thanks so much for taking my questions. Hayden, in the letter in prepared comments, it sounds like there's just an increased focus across the business. Can you just dive in into that thought and talk about a couple of places where you guys are investing more engineering and maybe product resources to be able to refine Upwork and more target your strategy as well as resources going forward?

非常感謝您回答我的問題。海登，在信中準備好的評論中，聽起來似乎整個企業都更加重視了。您能否深入探討這個想法並談談您們正在投資更多工程和產品資源的幾個地方，以便能夠完善 Upwork 並更有針對性地制定您的策略以及未來的資源？

And then, Erica, a question in terms of costs. You guys have done a great job in terms of identifying efficiencies. How do we think about that going forward, right? As you guys get through your '25 budget planning, how do we think about cost structure and the growth of costs as we get to that 35% EBITDA margin target in the future? Thanks so much.

然後，艾麗卡，關於成本的問題。你們在確定效率方面做得非常出色。我們如何看待未來的發展，對嗎？當你們完成 25 年預算規劃時，當我們實現未來 35% 的 EBITDA 利潤率目標時，我們如何考慮成本結構和成本成長？非常感謝。

Andrew, the way I think about this in terms of the focus is those to what and how of our work. So I talked earlier about the five growth levers that we're focused on in terms of revenue GSV. And these are not new. We've been working on these for several quarters. We talked about them last quarter.

安德魯，我認為重點是我們的工作內容和工作方式。所以我之前談到了我們在營收 GSV 方面關注的五個成長槓桿。這些並不新鮮。我們幾個季度以來一直致力於這些工作。我們上個季度討論過它們。

But certainly, as we continue to strategize and change some of the how in the business, we've stripped away projects and programs that were not directly lined up against these initiatives, and that lends us more focus, more clarity. And also, as we look under the hood of some of these things, we are going after them with fleets of smaller teams that are equipped, move more nimbly, more effectively against goal.

但當然，隨著我們繼續制定策略並改變一些業務方式，我們已經剝離了與這些舉措不直接相關的項目和計劃，這使我們更加專注，更加清晰。而且，當我們深入了解其中一些事情的背後時，我們正在用裝備精良、行動更靈活、更有效地實現目標的小隊艦隊追擊他們。

Unpacking those five levers and maybe just highlighting a couple of the ones that were particularly notable as we look back at this past quarter and some of the recent announcements, the second one around improving our customer productivity and accelerating work outcomes built on Uma, we just announced today, this acquisition of Objective, which is really enhancing our focus and our acceleration of our AI road map. And this is something that's been underway for a while. We are very lean and disciplined in this area, but with an incredibly talented team going after this and incredible features all the time.

解開這五個槓桿，也許只是強調一些在我們回顧過去的季度和最近的一些公告時特別值得注意的槓桿，第二個是圍繞提高我們的客戶生產力和加速基於 Uma 的工作成果，我們只是今天宣布收購Objective，這確實增強了我們的重點並加速了我們的人工智慧路線圖。這件事已經進行了一段時間了。我們在這一領域非常精幹和紀律嚴明，但我們擁有一支非常有才華的團隊一直在追求這一點和令人難以置信的功能。

Another place with a ton of focus is the enterprise area. We've been retooling the strategy. We sshipped Business Plus on October 16. This is coming out of a lot of work and insights that we've had in that area. And we've reduced the team size and enhanced the profitability of the entire business unit through the work that we've been doing to really strategize how we unlock that huge TAM, but in a very disciplined way.

另一個備受關注的地方是企業領域。我們一直在調整戰略。我們於 10 月 16 日出貨了 Business Plus。這是我們在該領域所做的大量工作和見解的結果。透過我們一直在做的工作，我們已經縮小了團隊規模，提高了整個業務部門的盈利能力，真正制定瞭如何釋放巨大 TAM 的戰略，但以一種非常嚴格的方式。

So lots of things happening in the business to make sure we're going after these huge levers for us in a very disciplined fashion.

行業中發生了很多事情，以確保我們以非常有紀律的方式為我們爭取這些巨大的槓桿。

Yeah. And on the cost side, the organizational realignment and the $60 million in cost improvements that we talked about on October 23, so these are part of an ongoing cost management that I talked about for several quarters, you're talking about cost optimization in the multi-quarter endeavor, and this is just really the next step in in that journey. I think those cost improvements, they're not incremental to our stated 5-year profitability target of 35% adjusted EBITDA margins but are really the step along the way.

是的。在成本方面，我們在 10 月 23 日談到了組織重組和 6000 萬美元的成本改進，所以這些是我已經討論了幾個季度的持續成本管理的一部分，您正在談論的是多個季度的努力，這只是這趟旅程的下一步。我認為這些成本的改善並不是我們規定的調整後 EBITDA 利潤率 35% 的 5 年獲利目標的增量，而是真正的一步。

We do expect the majority of the $60 million cost savings to benefit adjusted EBITDA next year. So there'll be a small offset that we add some of the OpEx for the Objective acquisition, which, overall, we expect to be highly accretive over time as the team helps us to improve search and match even further on our core platform.

我們確實預計 6000 萬美元成本節省中的大部分將在明年受益於調整後的 EBITDA。因此，我們將為Objective 收購添加一些營運支出，從而產生一個小額抵消，總體而言，隨著團隊幫助我們在核心平台上進一步改進搜尋和匹配，我們預計這將隨著時間的推移而大幅增加。

But with relatively consistent take rate outlook for next year, we expect about a few points of EBITDA margin improvement in 2025. But I think as our record demonstrates over the past, call it, a couple of years, we've had a clear focus on margin expansion, and we're fully committed to continuing that as we progress.

但由於明年的收益率前景相對一致，我們預計 2025 年 EBITDA 利潤率將提高幾個百分點。但我認為，正如我們過去的記錄所表明的那樣，幾年來，我們明確關注利潤率擴張，隨著我們的進步，我們完全致力於繼續這一目標。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Bernie McTernan, Needham & Company.

伯尼·麥克特南，李約瑟公司。

Hi. This is Stefanos Crist calling in for Bernie. Thanks for taking our questions. First, can you just give us maybe a little more detail on Objective, and what they do and how it will fit into the Upwork ecosystem?

你好。我是 Stefanos Crist 來找伯尼。感謝您回答我們的問題。首先，您能否為我們提供有關 Objective 的更多詳細信息，以及它們的用途以及它將如何融入 Upwork 生態系統？

Yeah, absolutely, Stefanos. So Objective is the company we entered into a definitive agreement to acquire and are announcing today, and they are an AI native search as a service company. And our goal is to accelerate the already all-time high performance we have in the search and match area of our core business as well as accelerating Uma's capabilities around images, videos, and audio content. And this we build on our successful M&A track record around identifying small tech and talent-focused acquisitions, which are aimed at advancing our ad strategy.

是的，絕對是，斯特凡諾斯。Objective 是我們今天宣布的最終收購協議的公司，他們是一家人工智慧原生搜尋即服務公司。我們的目標是加速我們在核心業務的搜尋和匹配領域中已經達到的前所未有的高效能，並加速 Uma 在圖像、視訊和音訊內容方面的能力。我們以成功的併購記錄為基礎，圍繞著識別小型科技和人才為重點的收購，旨在推進我們的廣告策略。

And this started last year with the acquisition of Headroom where we brought on board Andrew Rabinovich and his team, and they have been meaningfully advancing our AI road map, including all of the work on Uma and the features we've been launching throughout the year and most recently in our Upwork Updates.

這一切始於去年收購 Headroom，我們聘請了 Andrew Rabinovich 和他的團隊，他們一直在有意義地推進我們的人工智慧路線圖，包括 Uma 的所有工作以及我們全年推出的功能以及最近的 Upwork 更新。

So with Objective, we have been testing their capabilities with the proof of concept over the past few months. And this is really what gave us the confidence that their cutting-edge technology would have a meaningful and immediate impact on our platform once we brought them in-house. So it's a small deal. It's a very small but high-impact team, and we are looking forward to closing this deal in the coming weeks and welcoming them on board.

因此，對於 Objective，我們在過去的幾個月裡一直透過概念驗證來測試他們的功能。這確實讓我們相信，一旦我們將他們引入公司內部，他們的尖端技術將對我們的平台產生有意義和直接的影響。所以這是一件小事。這是一個規模很小但影響力很大的團隊，我們期待在未來幾週內完成這筆交易並歡迎他們加入。

I'd just add that given the healthy balance sheet that we have and the free cash flow that we continue to generate, we are going to continue to look for opportunities to expand our own market leadership, deliver exceptional and innovative products like the ones we're already shipping for our customers to grow our business and enhance our profitability through acquisitions exactly like this one.

我想補充一點，鑑於我們擁有健康的資產負債表以及我們不斷產生的自由現金流，我們將繼續尋找機會擴大我們自己的市場領導地位，提供卓越的創新產品，例如我們的產品我們已經在為我們的客戶發貨，以透過與此一模一樣的收購來發展我們的業務並提高我們的盈利能力。

Got it. That's great. Thank you. And maybe just following up on that. What does the M&A market look like? How many potential acquisitions do you see out there? And maybe different end markets you're looking at?

知道了。那太棒了。謝謝。也許只是跟進。併購市場是什麼樣的？您認為有多少潛在的收購機會？也許您正在尋找不同的終端市場？

Yeah, I think our posture is to achieve our goals around our product road map and the strategy we've outlined in terms of growth and profitability through M&A when and where it made sense. I think a lot of buyers are on the sidelines right now, but that's not our posture because we're in a great position to bring in the right company if and when they meet our very high bar.

是的，我認為我們的立場是圍繞我們的產品路線圖以及我們在有意義的時間和地點透過併購在成長和獲利方面概述的策略來實現我們的目標。我認為現在很多買家都在觀望，但這不是我們的態度，因為如果他們達到我們非常高的標準，我們就可以引入合適的公司。

So in this case, a company came that did meet our bar, and we were very pleased to make this deal happen. But of course, every deal is unique, and we'll see what happens next.

因此，在這種情況下，一家確實符合我們標準的公司來了，我們非常高興能達成這筆交易。但當然，每筆交易都是獨一無二的，我們將看看接下來會發生什麼。

All right, thank you.

好的，謝謝。

Maria Ripps, Canaccord.

瑪麗亞·里普斯，Canaccord。

Great. Thanks so much for taking the questions. Can you maybe talk about your thoughts on advertising spend next year in the context of your $60 million cost savings initiatives? And maybe more broadly, how are you thinking about your customer acquisition strategy in this environment?

偉大的。非常感謝您提出問題。您能否結合 6000 萬美元的成本節約計劃談談您對明年廣告支出的想法？也許更廣泛地說，您如何考慮在這種環境下的客戶獲取策略？

And then secondly, about any divergence in performance by smaller versus larger customers in Q3 and so far in Q4, maybe that you would highlight?

其次，關於第三季和第四季迄今為止較小客戶與較大客戶的績效差異，也許您會強調這一點？

Maria, I think the first question was on -- was it on advertising spend? I'm sorry, you came through a little garbled. Was it the advertising spend?

瑪麗亞，我認為第一個問題是──是廣告支出嗎？抱歉，您遇到了一些亂碼。是廣告費嗎？

Yeah, sorry about that. Yeah, just any thoughts on your advertising spend next year in the context of your $60 million cost savings?

是的，對此感到抱歉。是的，在節省 6000 萬美元成本的情況下，您對明年的廣告支出有什麼想法嗎？

Yeah. I think you're asking about business segment behavior in your second question. So first question, there's no change to our investment in our high ROI marketing investment. So performance marketing, other high ROI channels that we've been benefiting from, we see good returns on those investments, and so there's no change to that. We have -- where we did make some adjustments was in nonworking marketing spend, but that won't affect the customer acquisition or other things like that.

是的。我認為您在第二個問題中詢問的是業務部門的行為。第一個問題，我們對高投資報酬率行銷的投資沒有改變。因此，我們一直受益於績效行銷和其他高投資報酬率管道，我們看到這些投資獲得了良好的回報，因此這一點沒有改變。我們確實在非工作行銷支出方面做了一些調整，但這不會影響客戶獲取或其他類似的事情。

On the question on the behavioral things on with business segments, I would say one of the things that was notable in the quarter was that we did see a GSV per client increase in every business segment. And so that was -- we were really pleased to see those signals. That said, there really was no change from last quarter in that from a customer volume point of view.

關於業務部門的行為問題，我想說，本季值得注意的一件事是，我們確實看到每個業務部門的每位客戶 GSV 有所增加。所以，我們真的很高興看到這些訊號。也就是說，從客戶量的角度來看，與上季相比確實沒有變化。

We did see some relative strength on the very small business side compared to some of the larger business segments. And it's actually some of that consistency in trends that does lead us to be cautious on next year because we really aren't seeing a significant change in trend.

與一些較大的業務部門相比，我們確實看到了非常小的業務方面的相對優勢。實際上，趨勢的某些一致性確實導致我們對明年持謹慎態度，因為我們確實沒有看到趨勢發生重大變化。

And quite honestly, I think the multiple quarters of macro pressures are going to take some time to unwind and truly change business lending behavior.

老實說，我認為多個季度的宏觀壓力將需要一些時間才能緩解並真正改變企業貸款行為。

Great. Thank you so much for the call.

偉大的。非常感謝您的來電。

Brent Thill, Jefferies.

布倫特·希爾，杰弗里斯。

Hi. Thank you. This is Sang-Jin for Brent. First question I had was around managed services. You seem to be getting more traction or signing up more customers. I just want to see why -- I mean, is there more organic demand coming to you? Or are you making a big push there? And then I have a follow-up.

你好。謝謝。這是布倫特的桑金。我的第一個問題是關於託管服務。您似乎獲得了更多關注或簽約了更多客戶。我只是想看看為什麼——我的意思是，是否有更多的有機需求來到你身邊？或者你正在大力推動那裡？然後我有一個後續行動。

Sure, John. The traction in managed services, I'd say, has been building over multiple quarters and really relates to the fact that we have a very attractive value proposition that spans direct-to-talent offerings for larger customers who want to use that feature of our work as well as those who want to either extend beyond that and also have a build programs that are managed for them or who simply want that as a stand-alone offering that we can deliver for them. So it's been building. Our sales team is seeing more and more demand in the market for this.

當然，約翰。我想說，託管服務的吸引力已經持續了多個季度，這與我們擁有非常有吸引力的價值主張這一事實有關，該價值主張涵蓋了為想要使用我們的這一功能的大客戶提供的直接人才服務。所以它一直在建設。我們的銷售團隊看到市場對此的需求越來越大。

And so we have been, I'd say, leaning into where the demand signal and equipping ourselves with more go-to-market and other resources to capture the demand that we're getting and leverage that. When we did our Upwork Updates just a few weeks ago, we did enhance the capabilities of our managed services team with more AI enablement with Uma, which is continuing to differentiate our offering.

因此，我想說，我們一直在關注需求訊號，並為自己配備更多的上市資源和其他資源，以捕捉我們所獲得的需求並加以利用。幾週前，當我們進行 Upwork 更新時，我們確實透過 Uma 提供更多人工智慧支援來增強我們的託管服務團隊的能力，這將繼續使我們的產品脫穎而出。

In terms of the speed and the quality, not just of the talent, but also the entire workflow underpinning managed services. So this will be a continued focus. And I think it just speaks to the breadth of our offering and the demand signal we see for larger customers.

在速度和品質方面，不僅包括人才，還包括支援託管服務的整個工作流程。因此，這將是持續關注的焦點。我認為這只是說明了我們產品的廣度以及我們看到的大客戶的需求訊號。

Great. Thank you. And then on the Business Plus plan, I think during the prepared remarks, you mentioned that being sold more by the land team. Just wondering in terms of rationale, putting that as part of the marketplace line, is that because it's still more self-service anything? Or as opposed to why not continue to have in the enterprise line item?

偉大的。謝謝。然後，關於 Business Plus 計劃，我想在準備好的演講中，您提到了土地團隊出售的更多。只是想知道其基本原理，將其作為市場線的一部分，是因為它仍然是更多自助服務嗎？或者說為什麼不繼續在企業行專案中擁有呢？

Yeah. So the way that we've structured the land team is that they are now selling these Business Plus plans on the marketplace, right? So -- and one of the reasons we did that was really to open up the acquisition funnel to have a much wider access to new volumes of clients and be able to actively sell the parts of the enterprise value prop to marketplace clients to help them move up the value chain with us.

是的。因此，我們建立土地團隊的方式是他們現在在市場上銷售這些 Business Plus 計劃，對嗎？因此，我們這樣做的原因之一實際上是為了打開收購管道，以便更廣泛地接觸新客戶，並能夠積極向市場客戶出售企業價值支撐的部分，以幫助他們移動與我們一起提升價值鏈。

So it reduces our cost of acquisition, which actually reduces our cost of service cost to serve as well because it is a more self-service experience but has aspects of the enterprise volumes. So for that reason, the revenue would be recognized on the marketplace line.

因此，它降低了我們的採購成本，這實際上也降低了我們的服務成本，因為它是一種更自助的體驗，但具有企業量的各個方面。因此，出於這個原因，收入將在市場線上得到確認。

That makes sense. Thank you.

這是有道理的。謝謝。

Marvin Fong, BTIG.

馬文·方，BTIG。

Great. Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions and congratulations on the quarter. So another question on Business Plus. How should we think about how many of your clients would be a good candidate for this product line?

偉大的。晚安.感謝您回答我的問題並對本季表示祝賀。關於 Business Plus 的另一個問題。我們應該如何考慮您的客戶中有多少人適合該產品線？

And should we think about this product as being something a stepping stone for clients to graduate up the enterprise? Or do you expect them to stay on this plan for as long as they're on the platform?

我們是否應該將該產品視為客戶進入企業的墊腳石？或者您希望他們只要在平台上就繼續使用此計劃？

And then second question, just on the projects, the managed project service that you mentioned with Ocoya. Just talk about what that opportunity opens up for you. How much of project work relative to the overall market might that represent? Thanks so much.

然後是第二個問題，就專案而言，您在 Ocoya 中提到的託管專案服務。只需談談這個機會為您帶來了什麼。相對於整個市場，這可能代表多少專案工作？非常感謝。

Marvin, let me explain how to answer your Business Plus questions in the context of some of the insights we've gotten in this area through the last couple of quarters of testing. So what we saw was enterprise standard has -- is a plan that we had for many years now and has a ton of value within it, but has been out of reach for a lot of our target enterprise companies, both in the price point of the plan and the buying model. So we could only get those customers into Upwork through the sales team.

馬文，讓我根據我們透過過去幾季的測驗在該領域獲得的一些見解來解釋如何回答您的 Business Plus 問題。因此，我們看到的是企業標準——這是我們已經制定了很多年的計劃，其中包含大量價值，但對於我們的許多目標企業公司來說，無論是在價格上還是在價格上都遙不可及。所以我們只能透過銷售團隊讓這些客戶進入Upwork。

And so to your question about who the candidates now that we have Business Plus, we are really opening up a much larger pipeline of large buyers who can now get to this plan through a smoother glide path either by self-serving and upgrading from the marketplace as that second stone, as you mentioned, or by directly working with our sales team and coming in that way, which some larger customers require and prefer that as a way to set up a program of Upwork. So we have both of those at entry points now. And as we mentioned earlier, we're seeing hundreds of clients already in the couple of weeks since we've launched coming into this plan.

因此，對於您提出的關於現在我們擁有Business Plus 的候選人是誰的問題，我們實際上正在開闢一個更大的大型買家管道，他們現在可以通過更順暢的滑翔路徑通過自助服務和從市場升級來獲得此計劃正如您提到的第二塊石頭，或者直接與我們的銷售團隊合作並以這種方式進行，一些大客戶需要並更喜歡這種方式作為建立 Upwork 計劃的方式。所以我們現在在入口點都有這兩個。正如我們之前提到的，自從我們啟動此計劃以來的幾週內，我們已經看到了數百名客戶。

And to be clear, those are clients with multiple sizes, but that does include many clients of our enterprise grade enterprise quality clients were coming in through both of those channels. So this new plan allows us to much more rapidly and cost effectively serve our mid-market and large customer target audience with a more accessible and broader value position, while we also are selling managed services and other things also to these customers who want to buy that type of a program for us.

需要明確的是，這些客戶具有多種規模，但這確實包括我們的企業級企業品質客戶的許多客戶都是透過這兩個管道進入的。因此，這項新計劃使我們能夠以更容易獲得和更廣泛的價值定位，更快速、更具成本效益地為中端市場和大型客戶目標受眾提供服務，同時我們也向這些想要購買的客戶銷售託管服務和其他產品。

So it's a more targeted and segmented approach that aligns the value we have with the customers that we're seeing and testing in the market and has a lot of these benefits that we mentioned.

因此，這是一種更有針對性和細分的方法，使我們擁有的價值與我們在市場上看到和測試的客戶保持一致，並且具有我們提到的許多好處。

In terms of Lettuce and Ocoya, this is the very early proof-of-concept work that we've done around bringing talent that we have in our ecosystem in a more packaged way to delivering these work outcomes, almost like mini managed services projects into the ecosystems of these types of partner businesses in Business Plus and Ocoya to really deliver outcomes for their customers.

就 Lettuce 和 Ocoya 而言，這是我們所做的非常早期的概念驗證工作，圍繞著以更打包的方式將我們生態系統中的人才引入來交付這些工作成果，幾乎就像小型託管服務項目一樣Business Plus 和Ocoya 中此類合作夥伴企業的生態系統能夠真正為其客戶帶來成果。

And so this is early days. And certainly, it's very -- it's too soon, I think, for us to project how big this market or how big this opportunity is with this idea of Upwork talent being found in delivering work on an outcome basis, not just an hourly basis inside of the third-party ecosystem, of which there's thousands or tens of thousands of these businesses potentially is a very exciting and different buying model for us to be bringing and connecting demand and supply in a different way outside of our own internal captive ecosystem. So we'll keep you posted, but excited about some of the testing that we're doing.

所以現在還處於早期階段。當然，我認為，對我們來說，預測這個市場有多大，或者這個機會有多大，Upwork 人才是根據結果交付工作，而不僅僅是按小時計算內部的想法，現在還為時過早。生態系統中可能有成千上萬的此類企業，這對我們來說是一種非常令人興奮且不同的購買模式，可以在我們自己的內部自有生態系統之外以不同的方式引入和連接需求和供應。因此，我們會及時通知您，但我們對我們正在進行的一些測試感到興奮。

Great. That's super helpful. Thanks.

偉大的。這非常有幫助。謝謝。

Thank you. That concludes Upwork's third-quarter 2024 earnings call. Thank you for participating and you may now disconnect.

謝謝。Upwork 的 2024 年第三季財報電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與，您現在可以斷開連接。