Cuộc họp công bố kết quả kinh doanh Q3 2026 của Ibotta (IBTA): Doanh thu tăng 17%, triển vọng tăng trưởng năm 2027

Ibotta (NYSE: IBTA) công bố tăng trưởng doanh thu tăng tốc và biên lợi nhuận mở rộng trong quý 3 năm tài chính 2026, nhờ nguồn cung ưu đãi tăng, số lượng người đổi thưởng đạt mức kỷ lục và hoạt động sôi nổi trên các đơn vị phát hành bên thứ ba. Doanh thu và EBITDA điều chỉnh đều vượt mức trên của khoảng dự báo từ công ty trong quý thứ tư liên tiếp.

Điểm tin chính

• Doanh thu tăng 17% so với cùng kỳ năm trước lên 97,8 triệu USD, trong khi EBITDA điều chỉnh tăng 43% lên 23,8 triệu USD. Biên EBITDA điều chỉnh mở rộng khoảng 440 điểm cơ bản lên 24,3%.
• Doanh thu từ hoạt động đổi thưởng tăng 23% lên 88,5 triệu USD. Doanh thu đổi thưởng từ các đơn vị phát hành bên thứ ba tăng 43% lên 70,7 triệu USD, bù đắp cho mức giảm 22% doanh thu đổi thưởng trực tiếp tới người tiêu dùng.
• Tổng số người đổi thưởng đạt kỷ lục 23,6 triệu, tăng 30% so với cùng kỳ năm trước và tăng 13% so với quý trước. Tổng số lượt đổi thưởng tăng 40% lên 116,4 triệu.
• Ban lãnh đạo cho rằng kết quả cải thiện này đến từ việc thực thi bán hàng hiệu quả hơn, sự chấp nhận ứng dụng LiveLift, công cụ đo lường nâng cao, các chương trình mùa tựu trường và nhu cầu tiết kiệm của người tiêu dùng.
• Trong quý 4 năm tài chính 2026, Ibotta dự kiến doanh thu đạt từ 94 triệu USD đến 98 triệu USD và EBITDA điều chỉnh đạt từ 15 triệu USD đến 17 triệu USD.
• Triển vọng sơ bộ năm 2027 của ban lãnh đạo dự báo doanh thu tăng trưởng ít nhất ở mức giữa một chữ số, với doanh thu đổi thưởng cốt lõi dự kiến tăng trưởng tương đối nhanh hơn.

Kết quả tài chính cốt lõi

Ibotta đã mua lại khoảng 400.000 cổ phiếu trong quý 3 với giá 14,4 triệu USD, tương ứng mức giá trung bình 36,39 USD/cổ phiếu. Công ty còn 52,9 triệu USD trong hạn mức mua lại cổ phiếu được ủy quyền vào cuối quý.

Hoạt động kinh doanh và vận hành

Tổng số người đổi thưởng tăng 30% lên 23,6 triệu, bao gồm mức tăng trưởng 34% từ người đổi thưởng qua các đơn vị phát hành bên thứ ba. Ban lãnh đạo cho biết phần lớn mức tăng này đến từ tăng trưởng tự nhiên tại các đơn vị phát hành hiện hữu, cùng sự đóng góp nhỏ hơn từ việc ra mắt chương trình với Uber và Giant Eagle.

Số lượt đổi thưởng trên mỗi người đổi thưởng tăng 8% lên 4,9, mức cao nhất kể từ quý 4/2024 và là lần tăng đầu tiên so với cùng kỳ kể từ khi ra mắt Mạng lưới Hiệu suất Ibotta (Ibotta Performance Network). Số lượt đổi thưởng trên mỗi người dùng từ bên thứ ba tăng 17%, trong khi chỉ số DTC tăng 4%, đánh dấu lần tăng đầu tiên sau 12 quý.

Tổng số lượt đổi thưởng tăng 40% lên 116,4 triệu, dẫn đầu bởi mức tăng 57% trên các đơn vị phát hành bên thứ ba. Tuy nhiên, doanh thu đổi thưởng trên mỗi lượt đổi giảm 13% xuống 0,76 USD do cơ cấu ưu đãi và các hành động định giá chiến lược. Ban lãnh đạo nhấn mạnh hoạt động mạnh mẽ hơn ở các sản phẩm thực phẩm và đồ uống có giá thấp hơn.

LiveLift tiếp tục tăng trưởng cả so với cùng kỳ năm trước và so với quý trước. Trong một chương trình thử nghiệm của Danone được Circana đo lường độc lập, Ibotta cho biết Oikos và Activia đã tạo ra hơn 3 USD lợi nhuận thặng dư cho mỗi đô la đầu tư và thúc đẩy tiêu thụ thêm hơn 1,5 triệu sản phẩm. Chi phí trên mỗi đô la thặng dư đã cải thiện hơn 30% trong suốt chiến dịch.

Mạng lưới đơn vị phát hành cũng được mở rộng. Giant Eagle đã đi vào hoạt động trong quý 3 và cung cấp cho khách hàng số lượng phiếu giảm giá gấp gần 3 lần so với trước đây. Các ứng dụng 7-Eleven và Speedway đã triển khai các ưu đãi của Ibotta vào tháng 10, trong khi Festival Foods bắt đầu hoạt động trong quý 4. Ban lãnh đạo cho biết họ tiếp tục hợp tác với Walmart để nâng cao nhận thức và thúc đẩy việc sử dụng Walmart Cash, đồng thời gia tăng tích hợp các ưu đãi.

Dự báo của ban lãnh đạo

Ban lãnh đạo duy trì quan điểm lập kế hoạch thận trọng cho quý 4 vì tháng 10 thường là tháng có doanh thu thấp nhất trong quý và mùa lễ hội vẫn chưa diễn ra khi đưa ra dự báo. Công ty cũng lưu ý rằng quý 3/2025 là điểm đáy về doanh thu đổi thưởng, khiến việc so sánh kết quả quý 3/2026 trở nên thuận lợi hơn.

Đối với năm 2027, ban lãnh đạo mô tả triển vọng này là mức sàn ban đầu thay vì mức trần. Đóng góp tiềm năng từ các bản nâng cấp sản phẩm sắp tới chưa được tính đến với tác động đáng kể do quá trình triển khai vẫn đang ở giai đoạn đầu.

Rủi ro và các điểm cần theo dõi

• Tốc độ tăng trưởng dự kiến của quý 4 thấp hơn quý 3 do mức nền so sánh cao hơn và tính mùa vụ thay đổi khi kênh DTC và quảng cáo chiếm tỷ trọng nhỏ hơn trong tổng doanh thu.
• Doanh thu đổi thưởng trực tiếp tới người tiêu dùng và doanh thu quảng cáo tiếp tục chịu áp lực khi hoạt động dịch chuyển sang các đơn vị phát hành bên thứ ba.
• Doanh thu trên mỗi lượt đổi thưởng có thể tiếp tục biến động do cơ cấu sản phẩm và các hành động định giá nhằm tối đa hóa tổng số lượt đổi thưởng và doanh thu đổi thưởng.
• Hiệu quả của các chiến dịch mùa lễ hội vẫn chưa chắc chắn khi ban lãnh đạo đưa ra dự báo quý 4.
• Thời điểm và tác động tài chính từ thế hệ sản phẩm mới ứng dụng LiveLift của Ibotta vẫn chưa rõ ràng.

Điểm tin hỏi đáp với chuyên gia phân tích

Ban lãnh đạo cho biết việc chấp nhận ứng dụng LiveLift đang hưởng lợi từ xác nhận của bên thứ ba, công cụ đo lường chiến dịch tốt hơn và khả năng tối ưu hóa các ưu đãi ngay khi chiến dịch đang diễn ra. Dữ liệu bổ sung cùng các mô hình thế hệ tiếp theo dự kiến sẽ mở rộng phạm vi chiến dịch đủ điều kiện, bao gồm các chiến dịch có thời lượng ngắn hơn.

Về nguồn cung ưu đãi của nhà quảng cáo, Tổng Giám đốc (CEO) Bryan Leach cho rằng những tiến triển này được hỗ trợ bởi mối quan hệ khách hàng mạnh mẽ hơn, các đối tác ưu tiên, kênh đơn vị phát hành mới và việc tiếp cận các danh mục ngân sách bổ sung. Ông cũng cho biết các chiến dịch thành công đang khuyến khích khách hàng thêm thương hiệu và phân bổ thêm nguồn vốn.

Liên quan đến mức tăng trưởng năm 2027, Giám đốc Tài chính (CFO) Matthew Puckett cho biết doanh thu có thể tăng trưởng nhanh hơn triển vọng sơ bộ, tùy thuộc vào việc tiếp tục thực thi chiến lược tiếp cận thị trường. Tuy nhiên, công ty vẫn chưa tính đến đóng góp đáng kể từ các bản nâng cấp sản phẩm theo kế hoạch.

Ban lãnh đạo cũng bác bỏ quan điểm cho rằng 116,4 triệu lượt đổi thưởng trong quý 3 đại diện cho mức trần. Công ty kỳ vọng sự tăng trưởng tiếp theo sẽ phụ thuộc vào khả năng thực thi bán hàng, quy trình tạo ưu đãi dễ dàng hơn và việc tiếp tục mở rộng mạng lưới đơn vị phát hành.

Toàn văn biên bản cuộc họp kết quả kinh doanh

Toàn văn cuộc gọi công bố kết quả kinh doanh

Phần trình bày của ban lãnh đạo

Operator

Good afternoon, and welcome to Ibotta's Q3 2026 Earnings Conference Call. With us today are Bryan Leach, Founder and CEO; and Matt Puckett, CFO. Today's press release and this call contain forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include statements about our future operating results, our guidance for Q4 2026 and our preliminary outlook for 2027, our ability to grow our revenue and grow margins, our ability to grow supply and demand on our network, factors contributing to our potential revenue growth, our key initiatives, our partnerships, the expected performance and ramp of new publishers, client spending and offer supply, consumer demand and macroeconomic conditions, our capital allocation plans, including share repurchases and the capabilities of our offerings and technology, all of which are subject to inherent risks, uncertainties and changes.

These statements reflect our current expectations and are based on the information currently available to us, and our actual results could differ materially. For more information, please refer to the risk factors in our recent SEC filings and our 10-Q to be filed this week. In addition, our discussion today will include references to certain supplemental non-GAAP financial measures and should be considered in addition to and not as a substitute for our GAAP results.

Reconciliations to the most comparable GAAP measures are available in our earnings press release, our 10-Q to be filed this week and our Q3 2026 earnings presentation, which are all available on our Investor Relations website at investors.ibotta.com. Unless otherwise noted, revenue and adjusted EBITDA comparisons to prior periods are provided on a year-over-year basis. With that, I'll turn it over to Bryan.

Bryan Leach

Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for joining our discussion of third quarter results. A year ago, we were in the middle of a significant transformation of our business. Today, thanks to our team's hard work, our results reflect a company that is executing well and returning to sustainable revenue growth with attractive margins. I'm pleased to report third quarter revenue and adjusted EBITDA that were both above the high end of our guidance range.

Revenue grew 17% year-over-year, building on the return to growth we reported last quarter, while our adjusted EBITDA increased by 43%, illustrating thin e strength of our financial model. The revenue growth rate partly reflects an easier comparison to the third quarter of last year, which Matt will address in his remarks. But the underlying driver is the same one we've been talking about all year. Our advertiser offer supply continues to improve. That improvement reflects several factors, including stronger sales execution and a focus on our core value proposition, the growth of LiveLift, the benefits of enhanced first and third-party measurement, robust consumer demand for savings and the success of our seasonal events playbook, specifically back-to-school in this quarter. You can see this most clearly in our core redemption business. A year ago, redemption revenue was down 15% year-over-year. Since then, it's improved to down 5% in the fourth quarter, down 1% in the first quarter and up 10% in the second quarter. This quarter, redemption revenue grew 23%. Third-party publisher redemption revenue tells the same story. It declined 4% a year ago and has improved consistently, posting a 43% year-over-year increase this quarter. This robust third-party redemption revenue growth was driven by 57% year-over-year growth in redemptions on the digital properties of our third-party partners, a tremendous outcome for them and us.

On the demand side of our network, redeemer growth was exceptionally strong. We had an all-time high of 23.6 million redeemers in the third quarter, up 30% year-over-year and up 13% from the second quarter. We added 2.7 million additional redeemers between Q2 and Q3, our largest sequential increase since the fourth quarter of 2023, a quarter which benefited from the full rollout of Walmart.

Consumers are currently under significant pressure, and they're clearly looking for value wherever they shop. Increasingly, they're finding it through Ibotta offers that show up natively in the apps and websites of retailers like Walmart, Family Dollar, Dollar General, Instacart, DoorDash, Uber Eats, 7-Eleven and others.

Of course, more redeemers only create value for us if there are more offers to put in front of them. In the third quarter, third-party redemptions per redeemer growth accelerated to 17% year-over-year, the second consecutive quarter of growth. When looking at that metric across the entirety of the network, it grew 8%, the first time we've seen that occur since the advent of the Ibotta Performance Network. These results indicate that offer supply is growing faster than redeemer demand even as that demand accelerates.

Our success during back-to-school is a significant contributor to our offer supply growth. Back-to-school is one of the most important moments of the year for many of our clients. Shoppers are stocking up and making every dollar count and brands want to win share while volume is at its peak. The investments we've made in our revenue organization over the past 18 months are showing up in various ways.

First, we've grown the number of key relationships within our clients. In the third quarter, we increased the number of client contacts per meeting by 44% year-over-year. This metric has increased sequentially every quarter since the third quarter of 2025. Second, we're serving a larger percentage of our clients' brand portfolios. In Q3, we increased our penetration of brands per enterprise account by 7% year-over-year. Third, and finally, we are more involved in our clients' planning processes with more active preferred partnerships today than this time last year, with our clients indicating an intent to spend more. These preferred partnership agreements give us improving visibility on the forward revenue potential. To make all this more concrete, I'd like to share an example.

One of the world's largest food manufacturers was once a significant Ibotta partner but had reduced its investment with us over the past few years. Through deeper strategic engagement and an expanded publisher network, we've rebuilt that relationship. In the third quarter, this client returned to our list of 5 largest clients for the first time in years, investing more than 10x as much this quarter as it had in all of 2025.

Like many leading food manufacturers, this client is focused on restoring volume growth and regaining market share as quickly as possible. Our verticalized sales structure has given us the industry expertise to support those objectives, and our expanded network lets them reach consumers across multiple channels, ranging from mass to grocery, to dollar to convenience and last-mile delivery. Working with the client's brand, revenue growth management and sales teams, we have moved them from individual brand campaigns to multi-brand occasion-based programs. Our conversations with this client about 2027 planning are well advanced, and they're focused on a longer-term, more strategic approach to consumer incentives.

We also continue to play a leading role in the industry conversation about how promotions should be planned and measured. Over the past few months, our team has been on stage at Groceryshop with Danone, at ADWEEK House with Mondelez and Pernod Ricard, and at the Brand Innovators summit with McCormick. Our test versus control approach continues to be regarded as an important breakthrough in methodology and our partnerships with independent measurement companies back that up. Danone's recent experience with LiveLift highlights the relevance of that conversation. With a traditional temporary price reduction, a brand must plan weeks, if not months in advance. It chooses an offer value and duration upfront and the promo runs as plan, whether it's working or not. With LiveLift, Danone was able to launch a campaign within days and see how its Ibotta campaign was performing while it was still ongoing. It uses that information to adjust offer values across products.

And over the following 10 days, Oikos and Activia were able to scale with a cost per incremental dollar that was more than 30% more efficient than before. Over the course of the pilot, the campaign moved more than 1.5 million incremental units and generated more than $3 of incremental return for every dollar invested. Circana measured our results independently. Oikos outperformed the yogurt category sales lift benchmark by 1.4x and the featured Light+Fit 4-pack exceeded it by 4.8x. In both cases, most of the lift came from new households buying the brand, not from existing buyers buying more. Danone's Head of Strategic Insights, Planning and Connected Commerce described in-campaign optimization as "A distinction that's changing how we think about where the next dollar goes, not just how the last one performed."

Turning to our publisher network. Giant Eagle went live during the third quarter. Since switching to the Ibotta Performance Network, its customers have access to nearly 3x as many coupons as before, a result Giant Eagle has highlighted on its own website. We believe that reflects the breadth of our national offer content and the strength of our relationships with the brands that fund it. At Giant Eagle, we also manage the retailers' own shopper programs, which allows us to apply the work we've been doing on targeted and merchandise offers. That work is helping us to drive higher redemption rates and generate more value both for our clients and our publishers.

7-Eleven went live in October across the 7-Eleven and Speedway apps with 7NOW expected to follow and redemption activity is beginning to ramp up gradually. The convenience channel is where many of our CPG clients sell single-serve and smaller pack sizes, and it's particularly important for our snacking and beverage clients. We've had significant inbound interest from clients who are encouraged by this incremental opportunity to reach C-store consumers. It's still early days, but we expect to gain a better sense for the opportunity as we head into 2027.

Most recently, during the fourth quarter, our digital offers went live at Festival Foods, a regional grocer in Wisconsin that was acquired by Schnucks in 2025. We continue to work closely with Walmart to expand the visibility and accessibility of manufacturer-funded offers throughout the shopper journey. During the quarter, we partnered on customer engagement initiatives to drive greater awareness and adoption of Walmart Cash while advancing opportunities to integrate offers more deeply into Walmart's digital and in-store shopping experiences.

Last quarter, I said that we look forward to building on our momentum in the back half of the year. Our third quarter results show we're doing just that. Redemption revenue growth has accelerated every quarter this year. LiveLift continues to grow. Our redeemers have increased 30% year-over-year. Our network is larger and more diverse than it has ever been, and our team is executing well. We're carrying that momentum into the fourth quarter and into our planning for 2027.

Before I turn it over to Matt, I'd also like to highlight a recent change to our Board of Directors. In September, we welcomed Tony Weisman to the Board. Tony is the former Chief Marketing Officer of Dunkin' U.S. and former CEO of Digitas North America. He brings more than 30 years of experience helping the world's largest brands with go-to-market strategy, digital transformation and AI-driven marketing. His perspective will be valuable as we continue to expand the reach and impact of the Ibotta Performance Network.

At the same time, Thomas Lehman has stepped down from the Board after more than a decade of service. Thomas was an early believer and investor in Ibotta. And on behalf of the entire company, I want to thank him for his guidance and the many, many contributions he's made along the way. With that, Matt will walk through our results and outlook in more detail.

Matthew Puckett

Thank you, Bryan, and good afternoon, everyone. It's great to be able to share details of our third quarter financial performance, another quarter where our teams delivered strong results relative to our plans.

We are pleased with the continued momentum in the business and particularly gratified to see the business deliver an increase in adjusted EBITDA this quarter. This is now the fourth consecutive quarter in which we've delivered top and bottom line results above the high end of our guidance range. Just as importantly, our return to growth last quarter has been followed by a meaningful acceleration this quarter with total company revenue up 17% year-over-year.

We delivered revenue and adjusted EBITDA that were respectively, 11% and 83% above the midpoint of the guidance range that we provided on our second quarter earnings call as the stronger revenue performance led to an outsized impact on profit, a direct result of the operating leverage in our business.

Now to share the details of our top line results in the quarter. Revenue was $97.8 million, up 17% versus last year. Within that, redemption revenue was $88.5 million, up 23% year-over-year, driving the stronger-than-anticipated performance in the quarter. Our revenue team is executing our go-to-market playbook at a high level. This includes taking advantage of seasonal opportunities such as back-to-school and leveraging the growing scale of the Ibotta Performance Network to secure greater offer supply from our clients.

LiveLift revenue remains on track relative to our expectations, once again growing both year-over-year and sequentially versus Q2. Third-party publisher redemption revenue was $70.7 million or up 43% versus last year, accelerating meaningfully versus the prior quarter's increase of 27%.

Direct-to-consumer redemption revenue was $17.9 million, down 22% year-over-year and similar to recent quarter's results, where consistent with our expectations, redemption activity shifted to our third-party publishers. Ad and other revenues, which represented 9% of our revenue in the quarter were $9.3 million, right in line with our expectations and down 17% versus last year. We continue to see pressure on ad revenue as a result of lower direct-to-consumer redeemers, which is being partially offset by growth in other revenue.

Turning now to the key performance metrics supporting redemption revenue. Total redeemers were 23.6 million in the quarter, up 30% year-over-year. Third-party publisher redeemers grew by 34%, driven primarily by organic growth with existing publishers, benefiting from improved offer supply. To a small extent, the quarter was also impacted by the launch of Uber in the second quarter of this year and the launch of Giant Eagle this quarter.

Redemptions per redeemer were 4.9, up 8% versus last year. This is the highest that metric has been since the fourth quarter of 2024. And as Bryan mentioned, the first time it has grown year-over-year since the advent of the IPN, another outcome of the strong results this quarter. The driver of this increase was improving offer supply, which was only partially offset by the mix of redeemers, specifically the growth in third-party redeemers, which have a lower redemption frequency as compared to our direct-to-consumer redeemers.

Third-party redemptions per redeemer were 4.4, up 17% year-over-year. And for the first time in 12 quarters, direct-to-consumer redemptions per redeemer grew, up 4% year-over-year.

Redemption revenue per redemption was $0.76, representing a 13% decline versus last year, driven by the mix of redemption activity as well as strategic pricing actions. This quarter, we saw strong growth in food and beverage, particularly lower-priced items, which have a lower MSRP and thus, a lower result in redemption revenue per redemption. I'll add, and as I've said before, when considering our model and the absence of any meaningful cost per redemption, our strategic pricing actions are focused on growing redemptions and maximizing redemption revenue. That's how we win. Bringing it all together, total redemptions were 116.4 million, up 40% versus last year. This acceleration in growth versus Q2, again, driven by increased offer supply was highlighted by 57% redemption growth with our third-party publishers.

Moving down the P&L. Non-GAAP cost of revenue was up $2.3 million or 14% versus a year ago, including an increase in both technology and publisher-related costs. This resulted in a Q3 non-GAAP gross margin of 80.7%, up approximately 60 basis points versus last year and up 140 basis points sequentially versus Q2. Non-GAAP operating expenses were up 15% versus last year and were 60.2% of revenue, a decrease of approximately 150 basis points year-over-year. Non-GAAP operating expenses were slightly favorable versus our prior expectations as we realized certain timing-related benefits and modest spend efficiencies in the quarter. Within that, non-GAAP sales and marketing expenses were up 21% versus the prior year, driven by a planned increase in labor, higher variable compensation expense and a continued investment in third-party lift studies, partially offset by lower marketing expenses.

Non-GAAP research and development expenses increased by 15%, driven by higher variable compensation expense and AI-related costs. Lastly, non-GAAP general and administrative expenses, an area of the P&L where we are benefiting from operating leverage and cost control, decreased by 1%, while depreciation and amortization increased by approximately $1.5 million. We delivered Q3 adjusted EBITDA of $23.8 million, growing 43% year-over-year.

Adjusted EBITDA margin was 24.3%, up about 440 basis points versus last year. We delivered non-GAAP net income of $16 million and non-GAAP diluted net income per share of $0.62. Our non-GAAP net income excludes $15.4 million in stock-based compensation and includes a $4.2 million adjustment for income taxes. We ended the quarter with $149.9 million of cash and cash equivalents. In Q3, we spent approximately $14.4 million, repurchasing approximately 400,000 shares of our stock at an average price of $36.39.

We had 26 million fully diluted shares outstanding as of September 30. And as of the end of the quarter, we had $52.9 million remaining under our current share repurchase authorization. And cumulatively, we are pleased with the value creation of our share repurchase program to date. As of the end of the third quarter, we have spent $347.1 million since the program's inception to repurchase 10.4 million shares at an average price of $33.24.

And finally, on cash flow. In Q3, benefiting from the stronger earnings, we generated $16.8 million in free cash flow, a bit ahead of our expectations. Stepping back and looking at the year-to-date result, we've generated $48.1 million in free cash flow, an increase of 9% versus last year.

Now shifting to Q4 guidance. We currently expect revenue in the range of $94 million to $98 million, representing approximately 8% year-over-year growth at the midpoint. And we expect Q4 adjusted EBITDA in the range of $15 million to $17 million, representing about a 17% adjusted EBITDA margin at the midpoint. With that, let me provide some context and additional color on our outlook.

The sustained improvements in our go-to-market execution that Bryan described continue to pay off. Together, the performance of our product offering, including LiveLift, along with strong consumer demand for value on our network have driven 4 straight quarters of improving revenue trends. We believe that positions us well to deliver continued growth in the fourth quarter and into 2027. There are a couple of dynamics that we are navigating as we project the Q4 results.

One is specific to the comparisons, shifting contributions of our revenue streams over time and the second is relative to the actual business drivers and impacts. Relative to the first and recognizing our guidance implies a slower rate of year-over-year growth in Q4 than in Q3, our 2-year growth rate is relatively comparable across the 2 quarters. It's also worth noting that Q3 was our easiest comparison of the year as the third quarter of 2025 was the low point in our redemption revenue results. On top of that, our seasonality between Q3 and Q4 is changing.

Historically, our ad and other and D2C businesses have been more heavily weighted toward the fourth quarter. As those businesses become a smaller percentage of our total revenue, the typical step-up from Q3 to Q4 is becoming less pronounced.

Specific to our assumptions on business drivers, our back-to-school programs were extremely successful in Q3. While we could see similar strength during the holiday season, we're maintaining a conservative planning posture given that we've only just completed October, which is typically the smallest month of the quarter in terms of revenue and the holidays are still ahead of us.

Importantly, our team has shown we can move quickly to capture opportunities, and we're poised to do that should it occur. Looking beyond the fourth quarter, I also want to share some preliminary thoughts on 2027 revenue. The progress we've made across the business over the past several quarters, along with the impact we expect from work still underway, gives us increasing confidence that we are returning to a period of consistent and sustainable revenue growth.

Based on our initial planning, we project at least mid-single-digit revenue growth in 2027, which will continue to be highlighted by relatively faster growth in our core redemption revenue business. We'll share more detail about this next quarter.

Lastly, our balance sheet remains strong, and we continue to generate healthy cash flow. That gives us the flexibility to keep doing what we've done consistently over multiple quarters, investing in the organic growth of the business and our key strategic priorities while opportunistically returning cash to shareholders through our buyback program. As we prepare to close out the year, we're pleased with how much ground we've covered.

We've meaningfully increased the offer supply available on our network and demonstrated improved go-to-market execution. We've seen our product capabilities deliver effective outcomes and be well received by the market. We've grown our redeemer base at existing publishers and brought new partners like Uber, Giant Eagle and 7-Eleven onto the IPN.

We see plenty of opportunity ahead to build on these gains and create even more value for our CPG clients, retailer partners and consumers. With that, operator, let's please open up the line for Q&A.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question will come from Alexander Vegliante with Goldman Sachs.

Phần hỏi đáp

Alexander Vegliante

Congrats on a good quarter. I just wanted to ask about LiveLift. You mentioned that it's tracking in line based on your expectations and up year-over-year and sequentially. Maybe just an update on what the progress is there, the adoption rates by your clients and any continued investments that you need to make in order to accelerate that adoption, whether it's continued third-party lift studies or your go-to-market efforts?

Bryan Leach

With regard to LiveLift, we're pleased with how that's tracking. We mentioned the example of Danone in my remarks, using that product and finding terrific results. Certainly, the partnership with Circana has been helpful in corroborating the incremental sales results that we're able to pass along. I think just to remind everyone, the things that make LiveLift, LiveLift, the first is that we make a projection of incremental sales, typically a range. Second is that we measure incremental sales using a sophisticated statistical method. And third is that we then optimize based on what we found so that the campaigns can achieve their objectives more effectively. We're continuing to see clients that use that give us very positive feedback, introduce other brands to the LiveLift product. As far as ongoing investment, we're continuing to refine the models that do the projections and do the recommendations and optimizations. That's an ongoing thing.

The more campaigns we run, the more data we gather. As we get more data from our publisher partners and build next-generation models, we expect that more and more types of campaigns will be eligible, for instance, campaigns that don't run as long in terms of the number of weeks. But we're seeing very positive reception to that. The other thing is that LiveLift will be powering a new generation of products at Ibotta that are going to be rolling out next year. And I spoke a little bit about that in the last call. But the idea is that instead of just having a model that can do those 3 things, having a set of tools at your fingertips that allow you to do those things is even more powerful. And so that will be something we'll be talking more about in 2027.

Operator

Your next question will come from the line of Mark Mahaney with Evercore ISI.

Mark Stephen Mahaney

Okay. I'll throw out 2 questions. On that 2027 revenue guidance, I think you said at least mid-single digits. And just go through again why it would come out like that. I would have thought you would have been a little bit -- it would have been a little north of that given the recovery, the improved performance and the results, frankly, in the second half of this year. So are there particular factors that -- I know comps get tougher, but there is a real recovery here. So just talk through that a little bit.

And then secondly, just on one metric, how should we think about redemption revenue per redemption going forward? Is there a stabilization in there? Yes, if you just talk about that metric.

Matthew Puckett

Mark, I'll take both of those. As it relates to 2027, I mean, first of all, it's pretty early, and we're providing a preliminary projection. And as you well know, this will be the first time actually since we've gone public, since post IPO that we've provided really any forward view beyond the next quarter. But we thought right now, it was really important to signal confidence that we've got based on the growth that we've seen over the last number of quarters and the performance and the results that we're driving with our partners.

Certainly, the confidence is buoyed by the progress that we've made. But that said, we're not going to get out over our skis at this point. We certainly gave you what we think is a floor. We said at least mid-single digits. Could it be faster in 2027? It could. And certainly, some of those things will be a function of continued go-to-market execution, which has been really good. Could that drive more growth next year? It certainly could. I think we're just being careful.

The other thing I would say is Bryan talked about the progress that we're making with LiveLift, but really the product road map generally. We're not currently assuming a significant impact from those product enhancements as they roll out over the next several quarters, given it's still pretty early. And we'll have more to say on this next quarter and as the next year progresses. So stay tuned. As it relates to pricing and the redemption fee itself, overall, our goal is to drive more redemptions and more redemption revenue. That's the #1 priority. And we really want to deliver on clients' objectives.

In some cases, to achieve client objectives, we identify opportunities for strategic pricing actions. But you can know those are always done in the service of driving more revenue for Ibotta. Some of the downward trajectory we've seen in recent quarters and particularly in the third quarter is a function of offer mix. As we're successful in driving increased promotions on lower-priced items, which results in lower redemption revenue per redemption, I talked about that in my prepared remarks. And by the way, we saw that in Q3, particularly in food. It will likely continue. It's not easy to predict what happens to redemption fees over time. But if we feel like we can accelerate growth, whether it's short term, medium term or long term, we will, and you might see that number move lower as a result. I think the last thing I'd say on that, really important from a financial perspective and from our financial model, given that we really have no cost per redemption, certainly no variable cost per redemption, driving incremental revenue is a great outcome, and that's what we're focused on.

Operator

Your next question will come from the line of Bernie McTernan with Needham & Company.

Bernard McTernan

Maybe just to start, Bryan, I would love to get your -- what your initial reaction was of the announced Cart and Dash merger. Anything we should be contemplating on potential top line impact and bottom line? And then second, redemptions this quarter at 116 million, that was almost 20% above the prior peak. So I just want to see if there -- if that's the right kind of ceiling we should be thinking about going forward for redemptions and maybe your line of sight into that ceiling next year?

Bryan Leach

Yes, I'll tackle the first one first. So the merger, yes, I mean, we don't have a lot more information than anybody else. Our understanding is that they're going to be keeping these 2 services distinct and that our offers will obviously be available to users of both of those services. We have really terrific relationship with both Instacart and DoorDash. And I think this provides an opportunity for us to -- once the merger is actually complete and gone through regulatory and so forth, to actually apply some of the best practices and learnings from one environment to the other environment, which when that, yes, there are a lot of different ways in which we can think about how that could be the case.

But for instance, to maximize the redemption rate and the awareness making sure that all the different touch points where you could interact with this type of digital promotion will be available. As far as -- other than that, that's all I can say on that until I know more, I suppose. I'm not sure I fully understand the redemption ceiling question. I mean we don't view this as some kind of arbitrary ceiling for our business. I mean we feel like if we continue to execute in the ways that the sales team has been going to market, make it easier to launch offers on our platform, we absolutely can grow redemptions and redemption revenue beyond what we've achieved this year. And I would expect no less from our company. So unless I miss something, the answer is no magic ceiling.

Operator

Next up will be Ken Gawrelski with Wells Fargo.

Kenneth Gawrelski

Could you talk a little bit about how durable the unlock in supply advertiser supply was in the quarter. Clearly, a nice driver and to see that expansion in redeemers or in redemptions, I should say, suggests an unlock of some supply. Could you talk a little bit more about the durability into -- in the near term in the fourth quarter. But as you look into '27, could you talk about any kind of durable unlocks of supply? And I'll stop there and maybe I have a follow-up, please.

Bryan Leach

Sure, Ken. You can always have a follow-up, my friend. To the first question, I would say we have a level of -- we offer a level of scale, a level of sophisticated measurement and a level of speed that these companies are realizing they can't find elsewhere. And so if you need to grow market share quickly and you need to make a dent with an investment and you also want to trust that, that is being done in a way that third parties can validate and that is rigorous from a measurement standpoint, so you can continue to lean in based on those results. I think you're seeing a lot of people who may have pilot LiveLift come back and spend more, introduce new brands to Ibotta broadly, but especially to our latest tools. I think in terms of some other durable wins, there are new pockets of redeemers that are available.

So we've grown redeemers significantly, as you point out. And I think those are durable gains. You're talking about new ways in which publishers that we currently have are building awareness of this offering. So interacting with it in more places on their website or in-store, thinking about how we'll be able to build on that by making sure that it's part of their agentic algorithms, for example, their in-store shelf tag, tying in with those sorts of things. I think those are very durable. And obviously, we're on the front end of those benefits.

Then you get new types of budgets. So for example, when we launched Giant Eagle, being able to bring in access to their shopper marketing offers, their Giant Eagle exclusive offers is a wholly new budget for us that will be durable going into next year. That increases the redemptions and the number of redeemers, of course. And then I just think and proof the get scale in the sense that we'll hope to add even more momentum on the redeemer side, diversify even further the publisher base in our network. And I think that gives us more surface area, different types of customers.

For instance, the launch of 7-Eleven and Speedway, that's something that touches the convenience channel for the first time and brings in a different kind of customer. I think we gave this example of a top client of ours that went away almost entirely and is now back to being a top 5 client. I don't think they're going to suddenly -- I mean, knock on wood, but I don't think they're going to suddenly go away again. I think we addressed their concerns around measurement and proof.

And now we are building together in a really strong way based on that trusted relationship and having proven results. And so you should get more momentum when you prove that what you say you can do has actually happened. So I think in those senses, I feel really good about the durability of these gains.

Kenneth Gawrelski

Just one follow-up on the same point. Could you talk about -- maybe if you could weigh in on how much of this is competitive share gains in an existing budget pool versus your ability to unlock new budgets? You touched on it a little bit in your previous answer. But I'd love it if you could just weigh in. And I think it would do a lot -- it would help us a lot in thinking about the growth rate potential of the company as we look over the next 12 months to 24 months.

Bryan Leach

Yes. No, I think Ibotta really is in a unique position in the way that we go to market. There are some other companies that have specific relationships with specific retailers and provide the rails to power their -- principally their shopper marketing retailer-specific offers. But those are fixed budgets that we're not really growing because we're taking share from them or otherwise. I mean we are getting in there and we are proving that, first of all, you don't have to take a dollar from anywhere if what you're doing is driving top line and not eroding margin. So if you can show that you're delivering profitable revenue growth and paying back with very conservative measurement inside of a 60-day period on a cash-on-cash basis, people will go and find that money the same way they will when they have a set constraint on AppLovin, for example, and they like the iROAS or the payback period of that. They want as much of that as possible.

And I think that mindset is only possible now that we have the proof to show what that incremental sale is on a rolling basis. And they can say, gosh, this is actually something we've not seen before in terms of I want as much of this subject to this constraint, what we've called sometimes the outcomes era. There are situations where we've seen that we're able to pull dollars out of media or out of other promotion budgets, and we're helping companies creatively find those dollars in order to fund our programs. But I think those are not what I would call competitive share gains. Those are growing the number and types of people inside of an organization, whether it's the revenue growth management team, whether it's the media agency that are actually really intrigued by our scale, speed and sophisticated measurement. So I think that is a bullish signal from the standpoint of, I think, where your question is coming from.

Operator

Your next question will come from the line of Andrew Boone with Citizens.

Andrew Boone

I wanted to stay on Ken's line of questions. And so Bryan, what we're all trying to understand is kind of where demand came from. And in prepared remarks, you talked about stronger sales execution, focus on the core value prop, growth of LiveLift, enhanced measurement, demand for savings and then the seasonal benefit. Is there a way you can rank those things for us to just better help us understand where demand came from for redemptions?

Bryan Leach

Yes. I think that the way I would say that is number one is just delivering, delivering for our clients, calling our shot, running a program, it performs or outperforms and then they go and find more money. And they come back and say, yes, here's some extra dollars in the third quarter. We're really pleased with how this went in the second quarter. I'd say second and behind that lies a trust, a trust not just because of the results, but because of the relationship, the fact that we understand their business.

We are more upstream in their planning process. I mentioned that we have more visibility into these preferred partnerships than we have had in the past. I think that's another way of answering Ken's question in terms of durability. And because we're more upstream in the planning, we're further in advance, and we're not sort of reaping the -- still reaping the negative consequences of sort of some of the poor execution in late '24, early '25 before we executed our reorganization.

So now we're seeing is the dividends of good execution in 2025 paying off when that program that was scheduled as part of the planning process is there for back-to-school. And so you get a really vibrant back-to-school program. And I think there are some competitive tensions between our clients as well, where you see, gosh, this is now at a scale where I'm seeing my competitor move the needle in their market share. What is going on? Who do I call on Ibotta? How do I make sure I'm participating in an intelligent use of my promotional dollars.

And so you've got some of those healthy dynamics that are going on as well. I think the other things you mentioned are definitely important. I think that the third-party partnership with Circana continues to be a huge validator and unlock I think you combine LiveLift with Circana and you kind of go in and directly anticipate the objections or critiques that may exist and you help really reframe that mindset around I want as much of this as I can get rather than as much as I need to do in order to satisfy a retailer's demand. I think the fact that the publishers are leaning in, in various ways, helping to further improve measurement, helping to further improve targeting, helping to further improve awareness visibility. When you can talk about how now all of a sudden, it's going to be something you can see on digital shelf tags on digital end caps or an in-store mode, it's going to be personalized. It's going to be part of agentic solution. These are all the things they're thinking about.

And I think they view our team as kind of out in front of thought leaders, helping them make better decisions in the age of AI. So I think it's those things for the most part, honestly, Andrew. But there are little puts and takes. Obviously, back-to-school is always a particularly good event for us, especially in the food category in categories where we really needed to bring back customers, and we did that. So I think those are where it's coming from. And I think you're going to see a whole other wave of tailwinds in 2027 when we roll out this next generation of products. I think that's going to be the next big inflection point, but we got to see how long that takes, and that will be an iterative process.

Andrew Boone

And Bryan, I wanted to ask about the move towards more always on budget. It sounds like you guys are getting the measurement faster in 2026. And so as we think about 2027, the progress in the -- across the product road map. Is there a way that you guys can accelerate what is always on and get to measurement and ROAS faster? Is that part of the road map? Can you just speak to kind of your progress there?

Bryan Leach

Yes. Yes, absolutely. I mean this is fundamentally a statistical exercise. So you need to find enough data that allows you to make statistical claims that are significant between populations that are exposed and not exposed. Think of a test versus control type of approach. This really is a breakthrough, a major breakthrough in sophistication. It's the gold standard. And to do that, you need a certain amount of data and you need a certain amount of accuracy from your model, which is based on how many examples you've run through the model in the past.

And so the longer you're running a campaign, the more frequently that product that's featured is being purchased, the more quickly you develop signal, the more accurate your projections can be and the more effective your optimization strategy can be. And we are making good progress on that. We've really improved dramatically, I would say, over the course of the last 18 months, our ability to accurately project how long the campaign will last and including also improving our ability to project the performance of that campaign. And so as clients see that, they develop confidence and then they say, okay, we understand how this works. This is a range. As the campaign goes on, we get more and more and more precision, the range narrows. That's just never been a conversation that's happened in the promotions industry before. The conversation has literally been, here's how many clips I'm giving you. think that will satisfy the merchant, end of conversation.

So to actually have a conversation about profitability, incremental sales performance to even get to a place where it would make sense to be always on is itself a major move that has taken much of the last year to effectuate. And now we're sort of speaking the same vocabulary, getting in there and saying, okay, we're going to shoot for this. We all agree upfront that if we hit this, this is something we would keep doing, right? And we qualify the sale that way on the front end. And that way, when it happens, you're in a much better spot versus you ran a campaign and then you sent a recap deck and now you're debating over whether or not the methodology is valid or not.

You get a lot more credibility when you kind of say, well, we don't know. We're going to tell you exactly how we're going to measure it upfront. This is our best guess as a range. And then we will tell you as soon as we find out. There will be no time to interpret that or anything like that, it will just be showing up and then we'll all react to it. And it's not going to be a soviet election where it's a hunt 99% of the time, it will work the great majority of the time. And sometimes when it doesn't work, we'll adjust.

You might be too efficient, leaving profitable revenue on the table or you might be not efficient enough and needing to make the offers a little less generous, sacrifice some volume of incremental sales in order to get to your profitability goals. And I think that this kind of consultative approach where we really talk about the margin structure of their products at the SKU level beforehand is really paying dividends in terms of trust. And I think that's really what underpins willingness to switch to always on.

Operator

Your next question will come from the line of Ron Josey with Citi.

Ronald Josey

And Bryan, with that comment to both Andrew and Ken, just talking about budgets, perhaps the mix shift or the move to always on. With budgets unlocking here, just talk just a little bit more about the publishing network or the publisher network. I think you had some pretty good comments on Giant Eagle when that went live, you saw more coupons than before. And I wanted to hear a little bit more both about the publishers that have the off-line component, but of course, the Internet native ones as well and not necessarily the combination of the merger that we've seen, but just the adoption of these tools.

Bryan Leach

Yes. I mean I'm really proud of our team led by Amir, our Chief Growth Officer, and everybody has been working hard to add publishers to our network. We've added Uber. We've added Giant Eagle. We've added 7-Eleven. And we're just starting to roll those out, ramp those up. It takes a while for consciousness of these programs to kind of permeate. But -- it's also the work we've done with the publishers we do have, Instacart, DoorDash, Dollar General, Family Dollar, Walmart, and making sure that we are meeting their needs.

And where we're missing the mark, we're immediately correcting ourselves and getting them what they want. The fact that Giant Eagle was willing to go on to their own website and say, we've just tripled the number of offers we have, many of which are in the most critical food categories, not so top heavy on beauty products, for example, that's a really big deal in terms of the validation we think that provides of our network to the next publisher that we want to add.

Hey, listen, don't take our word for it. It's right over here. These are people saying, I switched from a competitor who I've been with for a decade to the Ibotta Performance Network. And overnight, got the feedback from our shoppers that, hey, this is great at a time when we really care about value and decide where to shop based on value. I think that's a really, really important validating proof point. And I think that as we become better partners to our publishers, we can point to all the ways in which that kind of consultative relationship is benefiting them.

So for instance, thinking through the future of agentic shopping, how do we position you both to have our content taken into account by whatever agents you may be building on your own experience, but also to make sure that you are positioned well to receive traffic from other agents that may be considering offers as a primary determinant of what products to put into a basket. These are just things that make us more and more sticky, more and more valuable. As far as the last mile or online publishers, I mean I think that we've really been intentional about our approach.

We focus on getting all 3 of the big last mile providers. And that, Uber, Instacart and DoorDash. And that's really valuable because a huge portion of the growth that's happening in consumer goods is happening in online purchases. In some companies, it's 200% of their growth. And so they know, okay, in one environment, I can set a campaign that's rational based on my strategic objectives, and those can evolve in the course of a year, but that will then allow me to really capture market share and have a competitive advantage in those environments. And that's I think, really powerful.

We know that a lot of them are tech forward, therefore, helping us out building these really sophisticated test and control approaches to measurement, which I think the industry has really never seen before. They're helping us solve this offline signal, this offline conversion problem that has plagued the CPG industry from an advertising perspective since the dawn of -- since the advent. There's never been reliable offline signal the way that we're building it right now. We're now focusing more on core grocery. So you see things like Giant Eagle and newer frontiers like convenience, coming into our network. And I think that is being well received, especially by those clients that really care about, for instance, beverage, snack, they care about some of those new areas, surface areas that we're putting out there. But it also -- you find it in different organizations, there can be different budgets for e-commerce or for last mile that are reserved and we now have access to in a way that have we not added them, we might not have. So those are some ways in which I think we've done a good job on the publisher growth strategy thus far this year.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Next up will be Nitin Bansal with Bank of America.

Nitin Bansal

So Bryan, can you provide an update on the health of your key verticals like where growth was more stronger or weaker versus your initial expectations entering the quarter? And if you can also share some color on how the current macro backdrop is impacting consumer activity and promotional supply on the platform, if you are seeing any changes in the budget allocation or consumer patterns that could serve as a leading indicator for the trends in 2027?

Bryan Leach

I think we saw broad-based strength across our CPG business. I would call out ongoing strength in the food category. We've seen emerging brands be a source of strength. Health and beauty continues to be a really great area for us sometimes because they have a little bit better margins to work with. And so -- but broad-based, and I'm really proud of the entire sales team that we've got out there with our verticalized sales structure that Chris put in place.

And we're -- I think there's not a pocket of our organization that hasn't raised their game in terms of execution. So I'm excited about that. We are -- I would say, in terms of the macro backdrop, I think that there is always a demand for intelligent deployment of resources to grow market share profitably. It doesn't matter whether you're facing pressures from tariffs or supply chain or for whatever reason, you don't want the only way you can grow market share be a very blunt instrument like a one-size-fits-all rollback of price that hurts your margins or an unmeasurable blunt instrument like certain types of upper funnel media that you really have no good basis for knowing whether or not they made a difference.

And so when you can come up with something that provides a way out of this problem where you say, well, what if I told you, you could grow your top line and grow your market share, protect against private label, but actually do that in a way that is either margin neutral or margin accretive, most people kind of look at you like, well, that's not possible. And so when you can show them that with math and science, it is possible, that's really exciting. And they kind of go, this could be the ticket that I've been really looking for. And so I don't think -- I mean, every time I get the macro question, I say the same thing, which is these are nondiscretionary purchases.

And we are a fundamental part of almost 24 million to 23-plus million redeemers every quarter, and that's a significant base of consumers that is appealing in all environments. As far as overall attitudes toward promotions, though, I will say that our -- being here as a thought leader, driving substantial investments through Luke and his team on R&D, actually putting the work in to say, we've come up with a better mousetrap.

Hey, here's a tool that's going to allow you to diagnose opportunities in your business using the latest trend data. Here's a tool that's going to help you quickly design the optimized promotion against your specific strategic objectives. Here's a set of tools that make it easier for you to deal with invoicing and back and forth or have a more self-service interface. This is not typical in our industry. And so I think what you're starting to see is Ibotta is not viewed as a promotions company per se, but as a solutions provider upstream in their strategic planning process, a platform that can help them really grow their business at scale.

And so -- that is, I think, starting to pay off. It takes a while to change that mindset, but I think we're starting to see the benefits of that. And so that will persist in the future regardless of the interest rates or the level of inflation, et cetera.

Operator

This concludes the Q&A section of the call. I would now like to turn the call back to management for closing remarks.

Bryan Leach

Thank you. I appreciate everyone's ongoing support and interest in our business. We've had a lot to prove over the last year. We said we were setting out to turn around, reorganize, rethink, reinvent certain aspects of our go-to-market, certain aspects of our product to really listen to our clients and build things that make a difference in their businesses. And I am incredibly proud of the trend line and the trajectory that our team has achieved. I'm also grateful for the questions and being pressed to become a more predictable business. I think we have better forecasting, better ability to provide the kind of guidance that hopefully the investing public is looking for. And I want to thank Matt and his team for doing a tremendous job of giving us that level of visibility. So with that, I appreciate it, and thanks, everyone.

Operator

Thank you for joining today's session. The call has concluded. You may now disconnect.