YouGov lauds data product growth as key to full year success

14th Oct 2013 08:05

A focus on data products helped online market researcher YouGov increase sales and profits in the year to July.Revenue grew 8% to £62.6m with profit before tax and exceptional items swelling 13% to £6.8m.The AIM-listed company invested in data products to lower its reliance on custom research, growing this area 17% in the year to account for 24% of group revenues.Chief Executive Stephan Shakespeare said: "Our investment in data products and services is yielding significant revenue growth while our custom research business is also still growing ahead of the market."YouGov continued to tighten its operating expenses, but as a result of the focus on data saw gross margins fall slightly due to higher external data collection costs as more international off-panel work was conducted.Geographically, the Middle East performed best, lifting operating profits and revenues 18% and 22%, while the UK drove a 19% increase in profit from an 11% improvement in sales. The US, the largest market by revenues, had a mixed period, with profits down 15% on revenues up 8% as the US custom research business suffered slower growth in the second half as two major clients unexpectedly reduced their activity.Looking forward, Shakespeare was encouraged that clients were demanding "a more data centric focus" to their market research and that for the coming year the company expected to see continued growth in revenue and profits. "Consistent with this, we plan to continue extending our panels to new markets and thus to offer our data and insights to ever greater numbers of clients."Shares in YouGov were up 5% to 73p at 08:30 on Monday.OH