In business, revenue is the amount of money that a company actually receives from its activities, mostly from sales to customers. To investors, revenue is less important than profit, or income, which is the amount of money the business has earned after deducting all the business's expenses.
Revenue growth, as well as income growth, is considered essential for a company's publically traded stock to be attractive to investors.
The term top line is often heard as a synonym for revenue; this term comes from the fact that in a company's financial reports, revenue is generally shown at the top, then all the company's costs and expenses beneath that, and then the income, or the bottom line, is at the bottom.
