More than 10 years ago, Scott Dorsey, Chris Baggott and Peter McCormick saw an opportunity to build an online marketing firm called ExactTarget. But when the dot-com bubble popped, the idea seemed like a loser. However, with much less competition, ExactTarget was able to build a top-notch firm.
Yet its IPO ambitions have been rocky. In 2009, ExactTarget tried to pull off an offering, but there wasn�t enough interest. The global economy was still trying to cope with the financial crisis.
Why not give it another try? ExactTarget filed its plans for an offering last week. Underwriters include JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank and Stifel Nicolaus.
For the most part, ExactTarget provides a wide array of marketing software, which is delivered via the Internet � the so-called cloud. The company helps with things like email, mobile and social campaigns.
To help grow its base, ExactTarget has been aggressive in forging partnerships. For example, its technologies are now integrated with systems from Salesforce.com (NYSE:CRM), Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT), Adobe (Nasdaq:ADBE) and SAP (NYSE:SAP).
ExactTarget has invested heavily in research and development. It expects to budget about $40 million for this category in 2011.
And it has helped the company to get strong traction. For the first nine months of this year, revenue increased by 55% to $148 million. In fact, the company has grown for 43 consecutive quarters and has more than 4,600 customers, such as Angie�s List (Nasdaq:ANGI), Priceline (Nasdaq:PCLN) and WellPoint (NYSE:WLP).
No doubt, some of the key growth drivers for ExactTarget include social media and mobile firms. According to Forrester, marketing spending on social networks is expected to increase from $1.6 billion in 2011 to $5 billion in 2015 (a big chunk will likely go to Facebook). What�s more, the installed base of mobile users is expected to reach 5.6 billion by 2015, according to a Gardner study.
In other words, ExactTarget is likely to keep up its hefty growth rate. And if the equities markets improve, the company should have a much better shot for its IPO this time around.
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