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spk02: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Rimini Streets Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. I'll now turn the call over to Dean Pohl, Vice President, Investor Relations. Mr. Pohl, you may begin.
spk07: Thank you, operator. I'd like to welcome everyone to Rimini Streets' second quarter 2022 earnings conference call. On the call with me today is Seth Raven, our CEO, and Michael Parica, our CFO. Today we issued our earnings press release for the second quarter ended June 30th, 2022, a copy of which can be found on our website under investor relations. A reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures has been provided in the table following the financial statements in the press release. An explanation of these measures and why we believe they are meaningful is also included in the press release under the heading about non-GAAP financial measures and certain key metrics. As a reminder, today's discussion will include forward-looking statements that reflect our current outlook. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from statements made today. We encourage you to review our most recent SEC filing, including our Form 10-Q filed today. for discussion of risks that may affect our future results for stock price. Now, before taking questions, we'll begin with prepared remarks.
spk05: With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Seth. Thank you, Dean, and thank you, everyone, for joining us today.
spk06: Q2 2022 results. For the second quarter, we had many positive financial and operational achievements. including strong subscription renewals and extensions, increased cross-sales of our expanded solution portfolio to existing clients, and we maintained our excellent industry-leading client satisfaction rating of more than 4.9 out of 5.0 for cases and onboarding. We achieved record revenue of $101.2 million, up 10.5% year-over-year, and above the high end of our guidance range. We also achieved a record revenue retention rate of 95% on subscription revenue and increased gross margin to 63.1%, up from 62.2% year over year. We continue to see sales growth in our newer application management services, professional services, interoperability, monitoring, and security services. And we believe our unique client experience and very high client satisfaction rating will drive increased loyalty, improved retention rates, and higher cross sales to existing clients over time. However, in line with other companies, we faced global macro environment and currency exchange rate headwinds that impacted quarter results. We believe that the macro environment will ultimately benefit our business after organizations complete a replanning adjustment cycle, and we are addressing it and other opportunities with changes that include my return to oversee global revenue operations to reaccelerate growth. Since Rimini Street's inception in 2005, we've signed over 4,800 clients, including over 180 Fortune 500 and Fortune Global 100 companies, and estimate that we have saved our clients more than $6 billion that they were able to reinvest in their businesses. We ended the second quarter with 2,905 active clients, a year-over-year increase of 9.8%. In addition, despite the labor challenges affecting many organizations globally, we were successful in expanding our global workforce by 17.9% year-over-year
spk05: ending the quarter with over 1,834 employees. Demand and sales execution. We continue to see strong and growing demand for our expanded portfolio of services.
spk06: Globally, companies face an impact to profits caused by continuing post-pandemic supply chain challenges, global macro challenges including war, sanctions, trade disputes, deglobalization, inflation, rising interest rates, and currency exchange rate movements. These macro shocks were originally believed to be short-term impacts, but are now being viewed as likely multi-year headwinds that are forcing organizations to replan their businesses, including their IT investment plans. The replanning phase has frozen many investment decisions. Frozen IT decisions impacted the market as a whole during the second quarter, as reflected in extended and delayed IT sales cycles for many companies, including Rimini Street. However, as previously noted, we believe that once organizations complete their replanning process, Rimini Street is well-positioned to ultimately benefit from this macro environment with growth and new client acquisitions. Rumini Street's portfolio of IT solutions provides the services many organizations need around their enterprise software systems and provides industry-leading value, ROI, and proven engineering capability. Our existing clients renew subscriptions at a strong pace as they leverage Rumini Street as their trusted vendor to support, run, secure, and drive more value out of their existing stable systems. Rimini Street is also helping them overcome labor challenges and focus their limited resources on strategic investments and key initiatives or to preserve cash. Accordingly, with both new client acquisitions and existing client cross sales, we continue to see a strong opportunity to expand our portfolio of enterprise software solutions and continue building and maturing our go-to-market capability to launch, sell and deliver our full solutions portfolio to new and existing clients globally. To achieve our goals, I am now dedicating a majority of my time to maturing our service offerings, delivering innovative new marketing and improving global sales execution. I was recently meeting with prospects and clients across North America and traveled to Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, the UK, and France. We have seen positive responses to our new television ads and seen better than expected attendance at our Street Smart client events around the world. In Japan, for example, we were very pleased to see nearly 150 executives attend our thought leadership event in person. demonstrating the value of the discussions, content, and our service offerings.
spk05: Buying case studies.
spk06: To highlight how clients are leveraging Romania Street Services globally to achieve their strategic goals across different industries, I'd like to share two case studies from the second quarter. First is State Library of Victoria, Australia's oldest library. They entrusted Rimini Street for support of their Oracle eBusiness and Oracle database software. Rimini Street is also providing the library with its advanced database security and advanced application middleware security solutions, two solutions in its Rimini Protect suite of security products. These solutions provide an innovative approach to security that can block vulnerabilities before an attack or close an attack vector within hours. unlike traditional and old vendor software patch models that can take days, weeks, months, or years to receive a patch and require significant testing time and cost to implement. Rimini Street's cybersecurity solutions provide the library with peace of mind that digital threats are being addressed. Chief Financial Officer Bradley Weiss noted that his finance team are very happy with the support and security that Rimini Street provides. which keeps their assets and their customers secure and their finance services running. He further noted that Rimini Street worked with his team to identify and provide solutions for the risks they face and that the team enjoys the services they are receiving, pleased with Rimini Street's responsiveness and the security capability we provide.
spk05: Next is La Very Fine Foods, based in France.
spk06: who is a leading fine foods retailer with facilities in 48 countries. Laverie switched its Oracle JD Edwards and Oracle database support to Ramini Street. With 80 application modules connected to the Oracle ecosystem, Laverie processes more than 500,000 batches of orders nightly. Maintaining the system became challenging after the software vendor ended full support for this mission-critical system. Liberi sought a solution to provide the mission-critical support they needed and create more value for the organization, while simultaneously reducing costs. Liberi's CIO, Lou Gaffa, stated that, in addition to supporting their ERP system, Rimini Street's experts provide guidance on potential changes to how they use the platform, and that the monthly and quarterly meetings with Rimini Street are extremely worthwhile. exactly the type of close, all-around support they were looking for. He goes on to note that Romini Street provides an efficient, agile service at half the price they were previously paying the software vendor. Given their digital transformation goals and financial constraints, Boveri believes Romini Street is a perfect fit for their needs.
spk05: Oracle litigation update. Rimini Street and Oracle have been in litigation for more than 12 years.
spk06: While the U.S. courts have confirmed long ago that third-party support is legal, we presently have two active proceedings with Oracle, the injunction compliance dispute and Rimini 2 proceedings, both of which relate to the manner in which Rimini Street provides support services for certain Oracle product lines. Ramini Street is not prohibited from providing support or services for any Oracle products. With respect to the injunction compliance dispute, Ramini Street has filed an appeal to the Ninth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals relating to certain rulings of the U.S. District Court. We expect the appeals process to take another nine months to a year to receive a ruling, but a ruling could come earlier or later. With respect to Rimini 2, the case Rimini Street filed against Oracle in 2014, the case remains in a free trial stage. Currently, the Rimini 2 trial is scheduled to begin on October 31, 2022, in Las Vegas, Nevada.
spk05: Please see our disclosures in the latest 10-Q filing for additional information on Oracle litigation. Summary.
spk06: We continue focusing on revenue reacceleration, exercising disciplined cash generation and management, driving shareholder value, and bringing our litigation with Oracle to a successful conclusion.
spk05: Now, over to you, Michael. Thank you, Seth, and good afternoon, everyone.
spk08: Due to 2022 results, revenue for the second quarter was $101.2 million, a year-over-year increase of 10.5%. Annualized recurring revenue was $396.7 million, a year-over-year increase of 9.6%. Revenue retention rate for service subscriptions, which makes up 98% of our revenue, was 95%, with more than 80% of subscription revenue non-cancellable for at least 12 months. For the second quarter, Clients within the United States represented 53% of total revenue, while international clients contributed 47%. Second quarter aggregate year-over-year revenue growth in the United States was 8.8%, while growth for international clients was 12.5%. We note that the U.S. revenue growth has continued to improve over the last four quarters, Improving from the 2021 second quarter year-over-year growth rate of more than 2% to the current year's second quarter year-over-year growth rate of 8.8%. We also note that our total revenue growth was negatively impacted by FX movements of approximately 1%. Billings for the second quarter were 101.6 million compared to 107.3 million year-over-year, a decrease of 5.3%. New client invoicing was challenging, as Seth noted, and negative FX movements adjusted down deal size in US dollar terms, but we achieved strong client renewals and cross-sales with existing clients. Gross margin. with 63.1% of revenue for the second quarter compared to 62.2% of revenue for the prior year's second quarter and 63.7% of revenue on a non-GAAP basis, which excludes stock-based compensation expense compared to non-GAAP gross margin of 62.6% of revenue in the second quarter of last year. We executed well in our service delivery and continue to methodically expand efficiencies and leveraged through technology and process control. We expect to continue investing in the global service delivery capability and capacity for our new products, services, and solutions to ensure we can deliver our best-in-class offerings with unparalleled client satisfaction. Therefore, for full year 2022, we continue to guide gross margin to be in the range of 62.5% to 63.5% of revenue on a gap basis, and 63% to 64% of revenue on a non-gap basis.
spk05: Operating expenses.
spk08: Like other organizations globally, we are experiencing cost pressures due to increased labor costs and inflation. However, we have been successful at mitigating this challenge in part by broadening our hiring practices with an emphasis to recruit more positions in lower-cost geographies and in part by using innovative technology. We continue to explore all options available to ensure we are able to acquire the talent we need to achieve our profitability and growth targets. Sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of revenue was 35.8% for the second quarter compared to 36.2% for the prior year second quarter. On a non-GAAP basis, which excludes stock-based compensation expense, sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of revenue was 34.9% during the quarter compared to 35.2% in the year-ago period. We remain focused on making the appropriate investments needed to support our growth initiatives and we continue to expect full year 2022 sales and marketing expenses to be in the range of 34.5% to 35.5% on a GAAP basis, and 33.7% to 34.7% on a non-GAAP standpoint. General and administrative expenses as a percentage of revenue excluding outside litigation costs was 18.6% for the second quarter, compared to 18% for the prior year second quarter and also declined as expected sequentially from 20.4% in the first quarter of fiscal 2022. On a non-GAAP basis, which excludes stock-based compensation expense, GNA was 16.9% of revenue versus 16.7% in the year-ago period. There were one-time employee-related expenses and software implementation costs and other various items impacting spend during the quarter. Moreover, we do note that our G&A expenses did decline nearly 6% in the second half of 2021 versus the first half of 2021 and see a similar trend this fiscal year. Current unexpected 2022 spend includes the investment in information systems, calls for additional personnel to support growth, costs as a public company, cost to support a global compliance operation, and incremental professional legal audit and insurance costs. Therefore, we now see G&A expenses in the 16.5 to 17.5% range, up from our prior range of 16 to 17% on a GAAP basis, and 14.8 to 15.8% on a non-GAAP basis. Net outside litigation expense was 3.1 million for the second quarter compared to 2.8 million for the prior year second quarter. Our outside litigation spend is not linear and can fluctuate each quarter based on timing and the nature of litigation activities. As Seth noted, the remaining two cases currently scheduled for a jury trial on October 31st, 2022, resulting in litigation costs that we had expected to incur during fiscal year 2023 being pulled forward into fiscal year 2022. Accordingly, we expect outside litigation expense to now exceed 20 million from our prior guidance of 15 to 20 million for the full year 2022. We are early in our trial preparation and thus should have more clarity to provide during our Q3 call. For the second quarter, net income attributable to shareholders was 110,000 or 0.00 cents per diluted share compared to the prior year second quarter loss attributable to shareholders of 4.8 million or a loss of 6 cents per diluted share. On a non-GAAP basis, Net income was $6.4 million or $0.07 per diluted share versus $8.4 million or $0.09 per diluted share. Adjusted EBITDA was $11 million or 10.9% of revenue for the second quarter. I would also like to highlight our non-GOP operating margin, which excludes outside litigation spend and stock-based compensation of 11.8% for the second quarter. underscoring the significant profitability potential and substantial leverage to our operating model. Accordingly, we remain confident in our ability to achieve our long-term target of operating margins in excess of 20%. Balance sheet. We ended the second quarter with a record cash balance of $160 million compared to $110 million for the prior year's second quarter. On a cash flow basis, For the second quarter, we generated $15 million of operating cash flow. And year-to-date, we generated $60.8 million, up from $47.2 million in the prior year first half. Deferred revenue, as of June 30, 2022, was approximately $300 million, up 13% from $266 million for the prior year second quarter. Backlog, which includes the sum of bill deferred revenue The non-cancellable future revenue was approximately $551 million as of June 30, 2022, compared to $571 million for the prior year's second quarter. Capital market transactions. During the second quarter, The Board of Directors authorized an increase to our previously announced common stock repurchase program from up to $15 million over two years to up to $50 million over the next four years. During the second quarter, we repurchased 85,600 common shares with a market value of approximately $508,000. The repurchased shares were retired. Going forward, we will look for additional strategic opportunities to repurchase common shares although we reserve full discretion on repurchase decisions and whether to activate or deactivate the plan at any time. Regarding the term loan, during the second quarter, he prepaid $5 million of principal value with no prepayment penalty, and the current term loan principal value is approximately $80.5 million. With a strong cash position and consistent operating cash flow generation model, We believe the company is able to comfortably fund growth, execute our capital return plan, and reduce debt in the interest of our shareholders. Business Outlook. We are currently providing third quarter 2022 revenue guidance to be in the range of 100.5 to 102.5 million, and we are maintaining full year 2022 revenue guidance to be in the range of 402 to 411 million. This concludes our prepared remarks. Operator will now take questions.
spk02: If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad now. You'll be placed into the queue in order received. Please be prepared to ask your question when prompted. Once again, if you have a question, please press star one on your phone now. Our first question comes from Derek Wood from Cohen and Company. Please state your question.
spk03: Hey, guys. Hey, guys. It's Andrew. Thanks. And nice quarter. Seth, we'd love to hear how the Americas org changes are going so far. What do you think we're in there and kind of what else is left to do there? And when do you think this can accelerate, reaccelerate U.S. growth even faster?
spk06: Yeah, great. Great to talk to you. We're definitely seeing improvement in the maturing of of the management structure in all the Americas, which includes North America and the South and Central America. We brought that all under a single umbrella, and I think we're seeing the consistency of execution improving between the regions. I think we're seeing some really good deals that are getting done, but I still think the macro environment is going to cause challenges probably through the third quarter in the Americas as well as globally. And we've seen that the macro challenges really affecting at a global level. So I think that's still going to slow everyone down a little bit in the third quarter. But as I mentioned in the prepared remarks, I expect that once these replanning cycles are done, you're going to see us benefit on the other side of that. We're involved in a lot of those discussions. The teams are involved in a lot of those discussions. with many name brand clients. And I think those are all very positive signs.
spk03: Great. And you hired the 153 net new employees. That looks like a record. What drove that and how our retention levels trended and where did you end on sales reps?
spk06: The retention levels are challenging as much as everybody else. The difference is We hit, I think, about 21% churn rate on employees, and the industry average is 23%. So we're trending about two points less than the industry, but we were traditionally about 10%. So it's high for us. So I still think that means we're in line with the market or a little bit better in terms of the churn rate. You know, we put some great programs in place like our Fabulous Fridays, which are fully paid Fridays for every Friday in July and August. So people love that. And I think we're doing a bunch of other programs which our employees really like. And it's energizing them in a post-pandemic world where it's giving them some time to get their lives back together and re-assimilate into society. We've also been bringing people together from around the world. for meetings that they haven't had in two to three years. So they're reconnecting with teammates. So I think all those things are going to help us bring down the attrition rate. I also think because the market is busy in hiring freezes and laying people off, that will cool things down a bit as well since our employees were busy hiring.
spk05: Yeah, that's great.
spk03: And then, Michael, on the guidance, leaving the full year unchanged, maybe just speak to the level of conservatism in that and anything extra you've kind of or what have you assumed as far as macro in the second half?
spk08: So, Andrew, I think we are certainly, as Seth noted, during this interim period with a lot of freezing for decisions that are happening out there. Now, we're feeling confident in our guidance for the full year, but we are reflecting that overall environment that Seth noted.
spk03: Great. One last one. Were there any big deals that pushed to the second half?
spk06: Definitely, there are deals that pushed. And I think, again, as you're seeing in so many different company earnings, delayed sales cycles, lengthened sales cycles. We're certainly seeing some of that as well, because as these companies and government organizations rejigger their plans in order to prepare for multi-year potential recession, different type of environment, they are not doing anything because they're not buying anything while they finish those plans. And I'd I think based on the involvement that we've seen, the kind of work that we're involved with clients and prospects around the world, we feel pretty positive about the fact that we're going to benefit when they finally finish their plans. We intend to be a part of them.
spk03: Great. I'll pass it on.
spk05: Thanks, guys. Thank you.
spk02: Our next question comes from Brian Kisslinger from Alliance Global Partners. Please state your question.
spk01: Great. Thanks for taking my questions. The first one may be a little long. The September quarter is, I believe, the most important quarter from a bookings perspective for your company. Case in point, last year, SAP and our international businesses generally have seasonal maintenance renewals. And we're early in the third quarter, but maybe I'm curious if you continue to see better win rates in these opportunities, especially as your business development team is more tenured. However, The second part of my question for that in one of your comments, I thought I heard that you're taking over the overseas international sales. So I guess given that timing, I'm curious what precipitated that change, if I heard it right.
spk06: Sure, Brian. Great to talk to you again. Two things. One, we made a change having the COO where all the GMs reported to the COO. Our COO has exited. And I am going to personally oversee all of the general managers. So think of me as kind of in the acting CRO role as well. I wanted to step back in. I talked to a lot of investors. I've looked at the business. And it was one of those opportunities for the founder, and we've seen this story before, to step back in to reaccelerate the business. We were previously a 30% type growth company traditionally. I think the opportunity and the demand is there for us to have that kind of business, even on a much bigger number. And I decided I was going to step back in and take it personally to get us where I believe we need to be and complete the transition to billion-dollar revenue scale by the end of this year. I think it's no secret that it's taken us a little bit too long to get through this transition. We should have had it done in a year. It's been 18 months, and I'm determined to complete the transition by the end of 22 and leave us in a very strong position out of the starting gate for 23.
spk01: And the second part of the question, is 3Q tracking much better than last year's 3Q with your more tenured salespeople?
spk06: Well, we are always very back-end loaded in the third quarter, so we truly are really early. But I can tell you that we closed some good SAP business even in the end of Q2, as well as early in Q3. And those are always good signs when we close deals on SAP that early. Generally, they're all sort of those last few weeks of the quarter, just the way it's all structured. So the fact that we're seeing early closes and we've closed several deals in the early parts of the quarter, I take those as positive signs.
spk01: Great. One last question, and then I'll get back in the queue. I think you've been clear there are some freezes in decisions that are hurting the third quarter. I guess what I'm trying to understand, your business is set up for – essentially a 50% cut to the OEMs in price. So you're well set to cut costs for uncertainty. Why is this not the time for, especially as maintenance renewals come up, for those executives to pull the trigger and move to third-party maintenance? Does that mean we'll wait another year until their maintenance agreements are up for the next year?
spk06: Well, it really depends. And I think, Brian, a lot of this is driven, as you know, by this daily global macro drama that unfolds by the day. And it's creaking havoc on businesses. I mean, there's no other way to say it. When you have so many different questions, should I build a factory in China? Am I going to have political issues with that? How do I deal with Eastern Europe? How do I think about energy if I'm going to build a plant inside of Europe? All these questions are now wreaking havoc to the point of causing internal paralysis for a lot of companies, and they're having to step back and rethink. Now, that doesn't mean they don't want to save money. That's why I said, ultimately, I expect to prevail. Now, when you mentioned saving money right off the bat, well, that's the maintenance business. Our AMS business is a year-round business. It doesn't have the same expiration date. It could be any date. Our security products, our professional service, all those things can be sold any time. And so, yes, there is a window under which they're going to have to make a decision. For those who have maintenance renewals in the third quarter of They're going to have to make a call about whether they're going to move forward and take advantage of better service and better savings and do the things that they want to invest in in the business with that savings now, or they could miss the window. And I think those are the kinds of things that have left us to keep the current guidance for the annual revenue is because we have really strong visibility on our recurring revenue. It's these new projects like everybody else. There's a little bit of we've got to wait and see. The visibility is not nearly as good as it was months ago, and we're just going to have to ride it out and see how we can move these deals forward through this environment.
spk05: Great. Thanks so much.
spk02: Sure. Our next question comes from Jeff Renry from Craig Hallam. Please say your question.
spk04: Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Congrats. Love that free cash flow again. So a few for me, though. If I could start with maybe on the revenue front, you've got obviously a pretty wide range, and this is for either of you, but a pretty wide range on the revenues. To the extent you can talk through that, what would it take to hit the high end, mid, and low? I understand there's variability, but we're coming into Q3. That's still a pretty wide range here. So how are you thinking about keeping such a wide range, and what gets this high and low in?
spk06: Sure, Jeff. Thanks. I think the range, we always narrow it down, of course, after the third quarter. It will have a much better sense. And I think the fact that we have a hugely predictable recurring revenue stream now that's a monster at hundreds of millions of dollars gives us a lot of stability and confidence in the range that we have. When we talk about What would it take to hit the higher end of the range? It's going to require a good Q3. As you know, we can have a great Q4, but it's not going to impact revenue that much on the ratable basis. That'll tee up 23 numbers nicely. But the real revenue, you know, you set your course in the first half of the year. The third quarter, you have to really have a good quarter to get to the high ends of those numbers. I mean, that's just the bottom line.
spk04: And would you say, I mean, from a pipe standpoint, and then I want to get to the sales transition in a second, but from a pipe standpoint, the pipe is there. So it's not, obviously the pipe's got to be there and already working. If you're going to get it done at this course, you'd say the pipe is there. It's a matter of close rates. And that's, that's still within reason to get at the high end based on the pipe you see.
spk06: I think the high, the high end is going to, is going to require, like I said, you know, a strong quarter. I think there's, there is pipeline to get mostly there. And then you always, in the third quarter, as in any quarter, we have these bluebirds that can come up traditionally, some very large ones, because customers come to the table late with a, we've only got weeks left and we'd like to do something. That is a pretty traditional occurrence for us. So we don't have to have visibility to a full pipe that would get us there. There, of course, is a coverage model that says there's enough in the pipeline for to make those numbers happen. But, you know, the reality is, again, it's that visibility with this constantly changing macro drama and even the exchange rates were pretty brutal on us in terms of so much of our revenue coming from places with reductions against the dollar. So, you know, a million dollar D in Australia becomes 800,000 bucks. So, you know, those things certainly working against us too. But I think the pipe exists to make it happen. It will take some really good work and some good luck in the economy and some cooperation with clients to pull it all together to get to the high end of the range.
spk04: Yep. Fair enough. And just a few other quick ones, if I could. On the expense growth, it looks like you're targeting someone in the high single digits, give or take, then on the revenue growth side. But the decision to keep Hammer down on headcount, I think you said headcount's up 18% year over year, and I know you've been very aggressively adding the last 12, 24 months. What are the puts and takes? I mean, what would it take for you to get off the gas on the employees, and just how do you think about the tradeoffs there?
spk06: I think it's really, we're at a position where you think about the hiring. A lot of it is in the gross margin area, and you've seen we've gone to 63-plus percent. But we also need a lot of headcount for AMS. AMS is a very labor-intensive business, and we're probably behind where we'd like to be. We'd love to have another 100 heads in the service delivery organization. And for professional services, we have major projects that customers want us to do that we physically haven't been able to staff. So, you know, there's some challenges there for sure. And that's why when you think about the hiring, the other thing to be careful of is don't get caught up in the FTE numbers. I'm always I'm actually always a little bit ambivalent about providing the number because, you know, while we grew it over 17 percent year over year, those heads could be in India or other countries where they're a fraction of the cost of a U.S. head or a European head or an Asia pack head. And so it could be a little bit misleading that you could have increasing numbers, but they may be very, very low-cost employees. So that number could be, like I said, you just have to take that carefully.
spk04: Yeah, fair. Last for me then, Seth, one other to follow up on a comment you made about the transition lingering 18 months. You want it done by the end of 2022. I know you're working on a lot of things, but what's one and two on that list? How are you going to know you've, quote, gotten there, you're done? I mean, what needs to happen by the end of 22?
spk06: Well, the close rates were very good for our sales team. I mean, we've been hitting about a 30% close ratio on our opening pipeline numbers, which is a strong close rate. That's not where the issue is. We want to increase the total volume of deals. You've got a maturing sales force. The number one issue that I have is making sure that the phone is ringing in marketing and building the pipe even much bigger. We want to see even larger multiples of deals and backup deals. That's how you reassure yourself in an environment where you have more flakiness in your deals, for lack of a better term. because of macro and whether people can make a decision and timing. When you get into that kind of environment, you want to double up your number of deals in the pipe so that for every deal that you have, you have not just one backup, but you have two backups, maybe three backups. And that's how you assure that you're going to get to the numbers that you want. So right now, it's all about building a massive pipe of business much bigger, much broader than we would normally require because you have to expect we have a higher fall-off rate or a deal gets extended and misses a deadline and a renewal time. That's what you have to do, and that's what we're focused on making happen.
spk05: Okay, great. Thanks, Seth. Appreciate it. Sure. At this time, we have no further questions.
spk06: Okay. Well, thank you very much, everybody. Thanks for joining us on our second quarter 22 earnings call. And I also want to thank all of our colleagues for their efforts in the second quarter. It's been very, very helpful. A lot of work went into the quarter delivering those kinds of amazing client sat numbers as well. We look forward to having everyone join us on our next earnings call. We'll discuss the third quarter 22 results and we'll select fourth quarter earnings performance to date commentary as well. Until then, please continue in good health and our thoughts and charitable support for those suffering in harm's way. Thank you very much, everyone. Have a great day.
spk02: This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for attending.
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