Whelp Revenue, Valuation & Funding (2024)

Whelp reported monthly recurring revenue of approximately $59,000 in September 2021, a figure CEO Seymur Rasulov said had repeated for two consecutive months. That compares to roughly $13,000 per month in September 2020, representing a roughly 354 percent year-over-year increase at the monthly level. Rasulov told Latka the company expected to close full-year 2021 at approximately $500,006 in total revenue. Annual revenue for 2020 was approximately $156,000, rising to approximately $708,000 in 2021.

Whelp reported more than 800 total users across 16 countries as of September 2021, of whom approximately 30 to 35 percent, or roughly 240 to 280 accounts, were paying customers at the time of the interview. The remaining users were on free accounts or active free trials.

Average revenue per user across the paying base was approximately $250 per month, though Rasulov noted it had ranged from $250 to $450. The per-seat price for white-label resellers is $30 per user per month. The free-to-paid conversion trigger is a volume threshold of 10,000 messages, after which users must convert or lose message history, a model Rasulov compared to Slack. Whelp also charges 10 cents per conversation when a chatbot or agent closes a support ticket, invoiced monthly.

Approximately 20 percent of customers are on the on-premise product. On-premise contracts carry a one-time setup fee of approximately $45,000 and a monthly maintenance and support retainer of $2,500 to $4,500. Cloud customers are on a subscription model. The average contract value for on-premise deals is $45,000.

Whelp generates revenue through three streams: on-premise one-time installation fees, monthly maintenance retainers for on-premise customers, and cloud-based subscriptions. The on-premise product is sold primarily to financial institutions and insurance companies. The cloud product is sold on a per-seat or volume basis, with a per-conversation charge of 10 cents applied when a ticket is closed.

Gross churn over the prior two years was 4 percent in total, a figure Rasulov attributed to heavy customization work done for customers at no additional cost and to the company becoming an official Facebook partner for WhatsApp Business API. Monthly ARPU across the paying base was approximately $250. With roughly 240 paying customers at $250 per month, implied monthly recurring revenue would be approximately $60,000, consistent with the $59,000 figure Rasulov cited directly.

The company spent $0 on paid advertising in the month prior to the interview, relying instead on blog content, LinkedIn, webinars, and a value-added reseller and white-label channel for customer acquisition. Prior to shifting to content marketing, the cost to acquire a lead was approximately $18. After the shift, Rasulov said the cost per lead had fallen to approximately $8. The company generates 40 to 60 leads per month and reported an 18 percent conversion rate from free trial to paid on a six-month basis. Profitability was not discussed in the interview.

Whelp had 32 employees as of September 2021. The team included two co-founders, 25 engineers, 5 dedicated salespeople, and the remainder in marketing and content marketing roles.

The five sales representatives each carried a quota of approximately $15,000 to $20,000 in new monthly revenue. Rasulov told Latka the team's collective target was $4,000,000 in total revenue for 2022.