*NEW* Marketing Report: 4 Billion Emails Analyzed, Datadog IPO and China Trade War: Newsletter August 30, 2019

Datadog, a leading cloud-based infrastructure monitoring company, has this week submitted documentation for an IPO. Datadog’s prospectus shows a placeholder amount of $100 million for the public offering, though this number is expected to rise. Datadog, a New York based company, saw revenue growth of 82% YoY to reach a quarterly revenue run rate of $333 million as of June 2019.

In entrepreneurial news this week, CEO Ismael Wrixen, who Insights Success Magazine recently named one of the Most Inspiring Business Leaders in 2019, gave an interview on SiriusXM Thursday morning to discuss trade war anxieties and what is next on the horizon for tech companies doing business in China on the Laura Coates Show. Listen to the full interview and make sure to subscribe on the FE International YouTube channel here.

The digital marketing world this week saw GetResponse release a new report on global email marketing trends, analyzing more than four billion email marketing campaigns across 126 countries. Analyses found that: subject lines performed best when they communicated high value keywords like “newsletter”, “ebook” and “PDF”; sending one newsletter per week drove the highest levels of engagement; urgent offers and promotions were most effective during their first hour. The report also states that email marketing remains one of the highest-ROI channels to engage an existing client network.

New in FE exclusive listings this week we have a highly-popular lead generation business in the B2B Retail Location Services niche listed for $261,000. As a market leading software in the multi-trillion dollar retail industry, this business has leveraged a unique functionality, mobile responsive layouts and advanced analytics to drive impressive MRR growth rising at a c.157.9% CAGR over the 2015 to 2018 period. With attractive SaaS metrics including a high LTV of c.$1,325, low net MRR churn of 2.2% and a lean operational model, this business has high net margins of c.79% over the LTM. Please follow the link above to request a prospectus.

In events news this week, Founder Thomas Smale had a great time at SaaStr Scale in San Francisco where he had a chance to catch up with leading business owners to discuss top trends in sales, marketing and customer success. Coming soon on September 13 in San Francisco, FE International is excited to be sponsoring Activated’s inaugural event! Entrepreneurs, founders and CEOs will gather in the Bay Area to tackle mental health and wellness barriers which many face in the fast paced world of business, to help create a healthier and more prosperous culture of entrepreneurship. Make sure to keep an eye out on the FE International newsletter for a link to the invite!

Continue reading below for more on Datadog’s preliminary IPO plans, the GetResponse email marketing report plus a bonus story on Google’s latest data fine.

Listings

New

SaaS – B2B Retail Location Services – $7.4K MRR

  • Market leading software with a firm foothold the multi-trillion-dollar retail industry
  • Extensive functionality with a five-star product rating on third-party review sites
  • Impressive MRR growth with MRR rising at a c.157.9% CAGR over the period 2015 to 2018
  • Attractive SaaS metrics with high LTV of c.$1,325 and low net MRR churn of 2.2%
  • Lean operational model allowing for high net margins of c.79% in the LTM

Yearly net profit: $74,000
Asking price: $261,000

App – B2B POS Mobile Payment Software – $2K gross/mo

  • Continuous revenue growth reaching a CMGR of 29.6% in LTM
  • Scalable platform with many five-star reviews in the lucrative mobile point of sale niche
  • Regular customer base with over 680 monthly active users
  • Low owner involvement with strong, growing margins and plenty of growth opportunities

Yearly net profit: $24,000
Asking price: $107,000

Featured

Affiliate/Display Advertising – Freight Transportation Technology Reviews – $14K gross/mo

  • Reputable brand with an early presence in a growing, evergreen niche
  • Strong traffic with over 140,000 visitors in the LTM
  • Dominant organic search presence with keyword rankings for thousands of keywords
  • Steady revenue growth with earnings rising at a c.117.9% CAGR over 2017 to (e)2019
  • Simple operations allowing for plenty of time to invest in growth

Yearly net profit: $170,000
Asking price: $450,000

E-Commerce – 8,000 Tier Amazon Merch – $1.9K gross/mo

  • Creative products with numerous five-star product reviews
  • Firm foothold in a lucrative platform with over 310 million Amazon users
  • Over 410 live designs with plenty of untapped design space for growth
  • Scalable Amazon Merch business on the 8,000 Tier

Yearly net profit: $23,000
Asking price: $71,000

Sold

Display Advertising – Digital Music Platform – $39K gross/mo – SBA Eligible

SaaS – B2B Email Marketing w/ AI Technology – $14K MRR

Affiliate – Diverse Portfolio of Review Websites – $2.2K gross/mo

In the News…

Datadog Files for IPO

Now a leading cloud-based infrastructure monitoring SaaS company, Datadog has announced that it has filed for a $100M IPO, a placeholder number as the business approaches its IPO date.

Datadog, an analytics and monitoring platform for tech teams and developers of all kinds, is in a relatively new space. In an age of digital transformation in which companies are regularly migrating to the cloud, Datadog was founded “to break down silos” by offering a real-time unified data platform. The number of software platforms used by businesses today can make it difficult to track performance across the different programs, which is where Datadog helps. They provide a “common data model, data integration, unified visualization and collaboration interface” to provide a single view into a company’s or team’s software. This is expected to grow into a necessary function for businesses who want to ensure that they are not losing time or money on disparate or underperforming software use.

Datadog has enlisted Morgan Stanley to lead the Nasdaq public offering, where the company will trade as DDOG.

Google Hit with Anti-Trust Fine

Google will be investigated for antitrust behavior regarding its Google for Jobs service.

In 2017, Google’s comparison shopping service brought about a $2.7 billion fine on the tech giant due to its violations of competitive behavior. This week, the EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager gave a speech in which she compared Google for Jobs to the shopping service, stating, “We’re looking right now at whether the same thing may have happened with other parts of Google’s business – like the job search business known as Google for Jobs.” Following a preliminary investigation by the European Commission into Google for Jobs, the investigation may or may not result in a formal antitrust probe.

The 2017 fine on Google’s shopping comparison tool will serve as a framework by which the Commission can investigate other services and tools.

GetResponse Releases Global Email Marketing Report

This week GetResponse released an email marketing benchmarks report, analyzing over four billion email marketing campaigns worldwide.

Taking a look at emails in the first half of 2019, the report covers strategies and campaigns across 126 countries and 19 industries, offering key findings broken up by continent, industry, subject-line keyword value, segmentation, industry and more. Now that GDPR has been in effect for over a year, the report also includes insights around its impact on email marketing: it found that while global averages are slightly lower, leading markets like Germany, France, the Netherlands and the US were largely unaffected. At the end of the day, advice remains to create email content that is valuable to the reader in order to foster long-term engagement.

Legal services, publishing and sports and activities industries had the highest landing page conversion rates. For more insights, browse the full report here.

For more updates throughout the week on the financial world of online business M&A, follow our team on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram