'Never good to be out of media for a long time,' says Info Edge MD on aggressive ad spending by Naukri

As white-collar recruitment platform Naukri.com's marketing spendings jumped to Rs 22 crore (approx) in the June quarter of FY25, parent firm Info Edge India's Managing Director Hitesh Oberoi said the company will continue to splurge on advertisement in the current calendar year.

Naukri's ad and marketing spending grew to around Rs 22 crore because of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 in Q1 FY25.

"Even though our business is growing slowly, we were on IPL in Q1. That's why our marketing spend went up in Naukri. We were out of media for a long time and it's never good to be out of media for a long time," Oberoi added.

"We don't intend to spend as much money. Q2 and Q3 are also normally a lean quarter for advertising. In general, we will spend a lot more on advertising this year than we spent last year on Naukri," Info Edge India MD said.

According to the quarter-first earnings of Info Edge India, the company's advertisement and promotion cost soared by 17% to Rs 100 crore from Rs 85.5 crore YoY.

The Naukri database comprises more than 100 million resumes, 14 million app installations, and roughly 22,000 average resumes were added between April and June 2024.

In Q1FY25, Info Edge's recruitment billings grew by 9% to Rs 431 crore, and revenue grew by 6% to Rs 472 crore. Revenue growth lagged behind billing growth due to the slower billing growth observed in mid-FY24. Operating expenses rose by 19% Y-o-Y in Q1FY25, led by costs from IPL campaigns, Oberoi said during the earning call.

Overall, Info Edge (India) recorded 9.3% growth in its revenue from operations at Rs 638.9 crore on a standalone basis for the quarter ended June 30, 2024, compared to Rs 584.3 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous fiscal.

The company registered a growth of 8.8% in its operating profit which stood at Rs 227.3 crore on a standalone basis in Q1FY25 as compared to Rs 208.9 crore in Q1FY24.