Quarterly Earnings Insights Q2 2020: BBY, INTU, DKS, ULTA, ADSK, CRM

This week we’re wrapping up our weekly earnings coverage for the 2Q earnings season with an interesting mix of companies ranging from retail to software. Best Buy, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and Ulta Beauty are the companies on the retail side, while Intuit, Autodesk, and Salesforce are the companies we are focusing on in the software domain.

As always, the data presented below is pertinent to desktop data only.

Best Buy Earnings Insights

Restrictions surrounding physical store locations led to a strong digital quarter for Best Buy.

• US visits to bestbuy.com were up 61% YOY in 2Q. The number of online visits in 2Q was spread almost evenly throughout the quarter, indicating a sustained shift of activity online.
• Best Buy’s online conversion rate (CVR) rose despite the higher volume of traffic, as many consumers are still avoiding in-person purchases. Bestbuy.com’s CVR in 2Q was 4.47%, more than 100 basis points above its holiday season CVR.
• Another way to measure economic activity is by looking at outgoing traffic from Best Buy to PayPal. In 2Q, 26.4% of outgoing traffic from Best Buy was to PayPal, the highest percentage ever.

Intuit Earnings Insights

Overall, Intuit’s digital assets have seen modest growth in 2Q.

• Worldwide Monthly Unique Visitors (MUVs) to intuit.com were up 3.7% in 2Q. The YOY monthly comparison of MUVs is interesting: YOY, April lost 12.7% of its MUVs, while May and June grew by 21% and 20.8%, respectively.
• Changes in US MUVs to myturbotax.com were even more drastic. In the quarter, US MUVs grew by just 1.7% YOY. However, monthly, the traditionally strong month of April saw its MUVs drop by 27.7% YOY, while MUVs for May and June were up 103.4% and 141.1% respectively.
• US MUVs to qbo.com, Intuit’s Quickbooks platform, remained flat YOY in 2Q, after 4 straight quarters of double-digit growth YOY.

Dicks Sporting Goods Earnings Insights

Dicks’ online store experienced a surge of visitors and shoppers in 2Q.

• US visits to Dickssportinggoods.com were up 70.7% YOY, with traffic in each month of 2Q growing at least by 60% YOY.
• Much like with other retailers, consumers aren’t just window shopping online but are buying more as well. Dick’s’ CVR went up 56% YOY past the 5% mark in 2Q YOY, a CVR usually reserved for the holiday season.
• Another way to track economic activity is by measuring website traffic to Dicks’ order tracking URL. Visits to URLs containing the string trackorder are up 162.9% YOY in 2Q, indicating increased activity.

Ulta Earnings Insights

Ulta’s most impressive achievement this quarter has been its ability to improve its conversion rate.

• Ulta.com has enjoyed strong growth in the US in 2Q, as US visits grew 19.4% YOY, its strongest growth rate in the past 5 quarters.
• Ulta’s US consumers are also more engaged; visits to the Ulta URL containing myaccount grew 21.3% YOY in 2Q.
• Ulta’s CVR was through the roof in 2Q, as it more than doubled YOY. We estimate Ulta’s CVR to have been 7.2% in 2Q, which is very high compared to its past performance and to the industry as a whole.

Autodesk Earnings Insights

Autodesk’s online assets performed well in 2Q, despite the stagnation in traffic to its free offering.

• Worldwide MUVs to accounts.autodesk.com, the company’s sign-in and sign-up URL were up 12% YOY in 2Q, indicating more active accounts.
• US visits to Autodesk URLs containing the word free (as in “free-trial” or “free-software”) were flat in 2Q, growing only 0.6% YOY. As Autodesk uses free offerings to urge users to convert to paying accounts, changes are worth monitoring.
• US MUVs to checkout.autodesk.com, the company’s online store, was up 32.2% YOY in 2Q and specifically strong in June (+117.1% YOY).

Salesforce Earnings Insights

Salesforce’s user base seems to continue to grow, and so does developer engagement on its platform.

• Worldwide MUVs to my.salesforce.com, which hosts the Salesforce platform enterprises use in their day-to-day activities, are up 11.6% YOY in 2Q, indicating that the number of Salesforce paying users continues to grow.
• US visits to Salesforce URL containing signup, used for free trial signups, has been down YOY for three straight quarters. In 2Q, it was down 2.9% YOY.
• Worldwide visits to developer.salesforce.com were up 21.2% in 2Q, suggesting that Salesforce is successfully building a community of developers to iterate and work off their platform.

Wrap Up

That’s it for 2Q, as the earnings season draws to a close. You’re welcome to check our previous insights with the added benefit of hindsight, and we’ll be back in 3Q for more pre-earnings insights!

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