Millennial Opps: NerdWallet files for IPO amid significant spend increases (Score 24)

NerdWallet, which helps consumers find credit cards, select mortgage rates and refinance their student loans, submitted paperwork for an IPO. The company reportedly hopes to go public by the end of 2021 and could seek a valuation of as much as $5b. Its details are confidential, but we will let you know what else we learn.

Up until now, NerdWallet has relied heavily on acquisitions to expand; over the years, it has acquired UK-based Know Your Money and NYC-based Fundera. Know Your Money is a peer company, and Fundera controls a marketplace that helps small businesses find loans.

NerdWallet also recently added to its leadership team with Ryan Harris, whom it hired as performance marketing VP in May 2021.

Once it goes public, NerdWallet will obviously have a sizeably larger budget it could use to advertise more heavily and/or outsource more work.

So far this year, iSpot reports the company has spent approximately $16.6m on national TV commercials, up 11% from the approximately $15m it spent within the same 2020 timeframe. NerdWallet ended up spending approximately $20m on this channel last year, over twice the approximately $8.2m it spent in 2019. The company's 2021 commercials have largely targeted millennials (slight male skew) viewing shows such as the 2021 NFL Draft, Late Night With Seth Meyers, SportsCenter, Jimmy Kimmel Live and Ridiculousness.

According to Pathmatics, NerdWallet has allocated roughly $27.8m toward digital ads YTD, up 61% from the roughly $17.3m it had allocated by this point last year. The company's full-year 2020 spend $37.3m similarly reached more than 2x that of $14.5m in 2019. Since the beginning of 2021, NerdWallet had earned around 2.1b digital impressions via desktop video (85%), desktop display (7%), Facebook (3%), Twitter (2%), Instagram (2%) and mobile display (1%) ads. 91% of this year's desktop video ads have been placed site direct, primarily onto youtube.com (34%), espn.com (15%) and weather.com (15%).

Additionally, Magellan reveals NerdWallet has aired 136 podcast ads within the past 12 months, a huge spike from the 27 it aired during the prior 12-month period.

This company primarily targets millennials through TV, digital and podcast advertising. As I briefly mentioned, I expect its spend to continue rising as NerdWallet continues pursuing an IPO. Per Kantar data, the company also invests in radio, OOH and local broadcast. It additionally began utilizing print media (via newspapers) in 2020.

Agency & martech readers - NerdWallet's recent DM hire makes reviews within the next eighteen months or so likely, and going public will do so even more. Keep the company on your radar for future work. Right now, NerdWallet works with media AOR Mediahub Boston and creative AOR Argonaut.