Annual report pursuant to Section 13 and 15(d)

Revenue Recognition

v3.23.1
Revenue Recognition
12 Months Ended
Jan. 31, 2023
Revenue from Contract with Customer [Abstract]  
Revenue Recognition Revenue Recognition
The Company derives its revenues primarily from two sources:
Subscription revenue consists of subscription fees from customers accessing the Company’s cloud-based software platform and applications, as well as related customer support services; and
Professional services revenue consists of fees associated with providing services that educate and assist the Company’s customers with the configuration and optimization of the Company’s software platform and applications. Professional services revenue also includes managed services fees where the Company’s consultants work as part of its customers’ teams to help leverage the subscription service to execute on their customer experience management goals.
The Company recognizes revenue upon transfer of control of promised products and services to customers in an amount that reflects the consideration the Company expects to receive in exchange for those products or services.
The Company determines revenue recognition through the following steps:
Identification of the contract, or contracts, with a customer
Identification of the performance obligations in the contract
Determination of the transaction price
Allocation of the transaction price to the performance obligations in the contract
Recognition of revenue when, or as, the performance obligation is satisfied
Subscription revenue is recognized ratably over the contract term beginning on the commencement date of each contract, which is the date the Company’s service is made available to customers. Subscription revenue includes customer support services, which together with the accessing of the Company’s cloud-based software platform, generally constitute a single performance obligation comprised of a series of distinct services that are substantially the same and have the same pattern of revenue recognition.
Amounts that have been invoiced because they have the unconditional right to consideration are recorded in accounts receivable and in deferred revenue or revenue, depending on whether the revenue recognition criteria have been met, with the majority being invoiced annually in advance of performance obligations. When determining the transaction price of a contract, an adjustment is made if payment from the customer occurs either significantly before or significantly after performance, resulting in a significant financing component. Applying the practical expedient in the FASB Accounting Standards Codification Topic 606, Revenue from Contracts with Customers, the Company does not assess whether a significant financing component exists if the period between when the Company performs its obligations under the contract and when the customer pays is one year or less. One of the Company’s contracts contained a significant financing component as of January 31, 2023 as a result of an advance payment from a large customer for a multi-year contract in the prior fiscal year. None of the Company’s other contracts contained a significant financing component at January 31, 2023.
Professional services revenues are recognized as the services are rendered for time and materials contracts or on a proportional performance basis for fixed price contracts. The majority of the Company’s professional services arrangements are fixed price contracts.
The Company enters into arrangements where it provides managed services associated with assisting its customers in publishing advertisements on social media channels. As part of those arrangements the Company is occasionally required to purchase advertising space from social media channels on behalf of its customers and invoice those costs back to its customer. Revenue from such arrangements is recognized on a net basis as the Company has determined that it is acting as an agent in these transactions.
Some of the Company’s product offerings include service-level agreements warranting defined levels of uptime reliability and performance and permitting those customers to receive credits for future services in the event that it fails to meet those levels. To date, the Company has not accrued for any significant liabilities in the accompanying condensed consolidated financial statements as a result of these service-level agreements.
For contracts that are modified for changes in contract specification and requirements, the Company analyzes the modification to determine the accounting treatment of the contract modification as a separate contract, prospectively or through a cumulative catch-up adjustment.
Taxes assessed by a governmental authority that are both imposed on and concurrent with a specific revenue-producing transaction, that are collected by the Company from a customer, are excluded from revenue.
Contracts with Multiple Performance Obligations
The Company executes arrangements that include multiple performance obligations (consisting of subscription and professional services). Additionally, the Company is often party to multiple concurrent contracts or contracts pursuant to which a client may purchase a combination of services. These situations require judgment to determine whether the multiple promises are separate performance obligations. Once the Company has determined the performance obligations, the Company determines the transaction price. The Company allocates the transaction price to each performance obligation on a relative standalone selling price (“SSP”) basis. The SSP is the price at which the Company would sell promised subscription or professional services separately to a customer. The determination of SSP for each distinct performance obligation requires judgement. The Company determines SSP based on its overall pricing objective, taking into consideration contractually stated prices, size of the arrangement renewal contracts, list prices and internal discounting tables.
Costs to Obtain Customer Contracts
Costs to obtain customer contracts, including commissions earned, that are considered incremental and recoverable are capitalized and amortized on a straight-line basis over the anticipated period of benefit. The Company determined the period of benefit by taking into consideration the length of its customer contracts, customer relationship period, technology lifecycle, and other factors. The Company has historically estimated such period of benefit to be three years. During the first quarter of fiscal 2023, the Company updated the period of benefit, noting that recent customer relationship periods extended to an average period of five years. Accordingly, the Company noted a change in the estimate of the amortization period of these costs and will prospectively amortize over a period of benefit of five years. The change in amortization period resulted in an immaterial impact to sales and marketing expense for the year ended January 31, 2023. Sales commissions paid for renewals are not commensurate with commissions paid on the initial contract given the substantive difference in commission rates in proportion to their respective contract values. Amortization expense is recorded in sales and marketing expense within the Company’s consolidated statement of operations.
Capitalized costs to obtain customer contracts as of January 31, 2023 were $113.5 million, of which $44.1 million is included in prepaid expenses and other current assets and $69.4 million within other non-current assets.
Capitalized costs to obtain customer contracts as of January 31, 2022 were $83.0 million, of which $40.7 million is included in prepaid expenses and other current assets and $42.3 million within other non-current assets.
During the years ended January 31, 2023, 2022 and 2021, the Company amortized $44.7 million, $35.5 million and $26.6 million, respectively, of costs to obtain customer contracts, included in sales and marketing expense.
Deferred Revenue
The Company invoices customers for subscriptions to its products in varying billing cycles with the majority being invoiced annually in advance of performance obligations, and accounts receivable are recorded when the right to consideration becomes unconditional. Deferred revenue consists primarily of customer billings made in advance of performance obligations being satisfied and revenue being recognized.
The term between invoicing and when payment is due is not significant and the Company generally does not provide financing arrangements to customers. Deferred revenue associated with performance obligations that are anticipated to be satisfied, and thus to be revenue recognized, during the succeeding 12-month period is recorded as current deferred revenue and the remaining portion is recorded as deferred revenue, non-current.
The Company recognized revenue of $276.4 million, $216.4 million and $180.0 million during the years ended January 31, 2023, 2022 and 2021, respectively, that was included in the deferred revenue balances at the beginning of the respective periods.
The Company receives payments from customers based on billing schedules as established in its contracts. Contract assets represent amounts for which the Company has recognized revenue in excess of billings pursuant to the revenue recognition guidance. As of January 31, 2023 and 2022, contract assets were $4.8 million and $3.2 million, respectively, and were included in prepaid expenses and other current assets.
Remaining performance obligations represent contracted revenues that had not yet been recognized and include deferred revenues and amounts that will be invoiced and recognized in future periods. As of January 31, 2023, the Company’s remaining performance obligations were $719.5 million, approximately $485.2 million of which the Company expects to recognize as revenue over the next 12 months and the remaining balance will be recognized thereafter. As of January 31, 2022, the Company’s remaining performance obligations were previously disclosed as $586.4 million but should have been $569.5 million, approximately $395.0 million (previously disclosed as $409.2 million) of which the Company expected to recognize as revenue over the next 12 months. The Company believes that the impact was immaterial to the prior year consolidated financial statements.
Disaggregation of Revenues
The Company disaggregates its revenue from contracts with customers by geographic region, as it believes that it best depicts how the nature, amount, timing, and uncertainty of its revenues and cash flows are affected by economic factors. Refer to Note 15, Geographic Information, for revenue by geographic location.