ZETA earnings call summary

Prepared Highlights

• Q4 2025 revenue of $395M, up 28% YoY ex acquisition and political candidate, accelerating from Q3 (prepared).
• Full-year 2025 revenue of $1.305B, up 30% YoY (27% ex LiveIntent, Marigold, political candidate); exceeded initial guidance midpoint by $65M (5%) (CFO).
• Q4 adjusted EBITDA of $95.1M, up 35% YoY; margin of 24.1%, up 174 bps YoY; 20th consecutive quarter of YoY margin expansion (CFO).
• Q4 GAAP net income of $6.5M, positive for the first time; full-year 2026 expected to be GAAP net income positive (CFO).
• Q4 net cash from operations of $64.1M, up 47% YoY; free cash flow of $55.8M, up 76% YoY, margin of 14%; free cash flow conversion of 59% (CFO).
• Full-year 2025 free cash flow of $165M, margin of 12.6%, up 78% YoY (CFO).
• Net revenue retention hit a record 120% in 2025, up from 114% in 2024 (CEO).
• Super-scaled customer count ended Q4 at 184, up 24% YoY; scaled customer count at 602, up 14% YoY (CFO).
• Scaled customer quarterly ARPU of $625K, up 8% YoY; super-scaled customer quarterly ARPU of $1.8M, up 5% YoY (both >15% normalizing for political) (CFO).
• 9 out of top 10 verticals grew >20% in 2025; fastest: travel/hospitality (+105%), advertising/marketing (+70%), automotive (+60%), consumer retail (+46%) (CFO).
• RFP volume more than doubled YoY to a new record (CEO).
• SuperGraph covers >245M U.S. adults and 535M globally, with >1T signals (CEO).
• Q4 2025 share repurchases: 1.9M shares for $35M; full-year 2025: 7.9M shares for $120M; YTD 2026 through mid-Feb: 1.5M shares for $25M (CFO).

Official Guidance (2026)

• Full-year 2026 revenue: midpoint raised to $1.755B (up $25M from prior), representing 35% YoY growth (21% ex Marigold and political candidate) (CFO).
• Full-year 2026 adjusted EBITDA: midpoint $391M, up $6M from prior, margin 22.3%, up 92 bps YoY (CFO).
• Full-year 2026 free cash flow: midpoint $231M, up $7M from prior, conversion of 59% of adjusted EBITDA (CFO).
• Q1 2026 revenue: midpoint $370M, up $8M from prior, YoY growth of 40% (22% ex political and Marigold) (CFO).
• Q1 2026 adjusted EBITDA: midpoint $61.5M, up from prior $60M, margin 16.6% (CFO).
• Zeta 2028 targets (updated with Marigold): revenue target raised to $2.3B (CAGR 23%), adjusted EBITDA target $573M (25% margin), free cash flow target $371M (65% conversion) (CFO).

Mgmt Quotes

• "The flywheel is what drives durable, predictable and profitable growth." (CEO)
• "Our AI investments, which began 8 years ago, are yielding better and better results." (CEO)
• "We are also seeing strong interest from Zeta customers in adopting Marigold's loyalty product." (CEO)
• "This represents a free cash flow conversion of 59%, a significant improvement from 45% in the fourth quarter of 2024." (CFO)
• "In environments like today, it is more important than ever to control the controllable." (CFO)

Prepared Metrics

Q&A Batch (1-5 of 5)

Q1 — Terrell Tillman

• Topic: Athena agent rollout, monetization, and guidance conservatism
• Key points:
  • Two agents (Insights and Adviser) are first because they drive greatest customer benefit; Athena will be generally available by end of Q1 2026.
  • Early client feedback: Athena is "game changing" for workflow and drives "substantially higher" ROI than the existing 600% return on ad spend.
  • Guidance assumes minimal Athena contribution; political candidate revenue kept at $15 million (conservative); Marigold also conservatively assumed.
  • 9 out of top 10 verticals grew over 20% on a trailing 12-month basis; guidance assumes roughly half that growth rate.
• Mgmt stance: Bullish — management sees Athena as incremental upside, guidance is "nicely derisked," and early deals (nearly $40 million from Zeta Live) are just the start.

Q2 — Jason Kreyer

• Topic: One Zeta cross-sell, net retention, and international expansion
• Key points:
  • Enterprise clients using more than one use case in Q4 2025 was up 80% year-over-year; scaled customers on multiple use cases reached ~25% (vs. ~13% a year ago).
  • Net retention rate for 2025 was 120%, up from historical 110%–115%.
  • Moving from one use case to two yields an average 200%–300% revenue uplift.
  • International revenue is growing naturally but remains a small portion; vast majority of revenue is in the U.S., which grew 30% vs. market average ~10%.
• Mgmt stance: Bullish — One Zeta strategy is working, evidenced by 80% multi-use-case growth and 120% net retention; international is a long-term opportunity, not near-term driver.

Q3 — David Hynes

• Topic: OpenAI partnership and data collection impact from AI answer engines
• Key points:
  • OpenAI partnership is "foundational to Athena"; management views LLMs as a component of the stack, similar to AWS or Snowflake.
  • No observed decline in Disqus comment volume or authenticated site visits due to AI answer engines.
  • Google now answers >60% of queries on its platform (vs. >90% directed off-platform historically), driving up cost-per-click and creating a tailwind for Zeta.
  • Disqus is one of ~20 platforms generating real-time signals; Publisher Cloud (including LiveIntent and Sailthru) drives traffic back to publishers.
• Mgmt stance: Bullish — OpenAI partnership is instrumental; AI answer engines are a tailwind, not a headwind, for Zeta's data and traffic-driving capabilities.

Q4 — Richard Baldry

• Topic: Sales headcount, capital allocation (buybacks vs. M&A), and net retention drivers
• Key points:
  • Quota carriers increased ~10% sequentially, with ~15 added from Marigold; cross-training involves teaming Marigold salespeople with Zeta's, focusing on top 30 Fortune 500 clients.
  • $130 million remaining on existing buyback; management expects to announce a next buyback (each prior was 100% larger than the previous).
  • Repurchase-to-free-cash-flow ratio was 45% in 2024 and 73% in 2025; model targets at least 50% of free cash flow.
  • Net retention of 120% was driven by new customers from late 2024 scaling, multi-use-case adoption, and growth within agency holdcos (brands within holdcos up 80% year-over-year).
• Mgmt stance: Bullish — Buybacks are the best use of capital at current levels; M&A is possible but not imminent; net retention is sustainable with Athena as a future catalyst.

Q5 — Carolyn Valenti

• Topic: Data Cloud expansion and capturing data from LLM interactions
• Key points:
  • Zeta has rolled out its own generative optimization platform (GEO) to help clients feed information into LLMs and learn how models ingest data.
  • Data Cloud currently ingests "trillions of signals"; management considers it the best data cloud in the world.
  • GEO is strategic for both client marketing and understanding LLM behavior.
• Mgmt stance: Neutral-to-bullish — Data Cloud is already comprehensive; GEO provides a new channel for data capture and learning, but no specific M&A plans are flagged.