The Blind Spot Slowing Down B2B Media Growth

00:00 – 01:42 | Meet Sean Griffey Heather introduces Sean and sets up the conversation around Industry Dive’s rise, niche media economics, and revenue excellence.

01:42 – 07:44 | Lessons From Fierce Markets & Launching Industry Dive Sean explains why niche audiences + mobile disruption created an opportunity, and why they launched with five publications from day one to force scalable operations.

07:44 – 15:12 | Building a Portfolio Sales Engine Industry Dive organized sales by buyer, not brand. Sean breaks down how this unlocked massive cross-portfolio deals and why they later introduced an “enterprise black belt” team to drive deeper account penetration.

15:12 – 23:53 | Territory Design, Enterprise Accounts & Customer Expectations They discuss shrinking territories, advanced campaign strategy, and why sales and account management must jointly own customer success and expansion.

23:53 – 31:23 | Revenue Infrastructure & First-Party Data Sean shares how Industry Dive operated on Salesforce end-to-end, built an early CDP before CDPs existed, and prioritized true first-party engagement over vanity metrics.

31:23 – 35:53 | Audience Value, Outcomes & the Broken B2B Media Model They explore why impressions and pageviews are meaningless, the need to measure client outcomes, and how media must evolve to solve real buyer problems.

35:53 – 39:31 | AI’s Impact on Content, Search & Efficiency Sean frames AI as an efficiency tool—not an overnight transformation—and warns about overreliance on search traffic as AI reshapes discovery.

39:31 – 46:53 | Events, Community & the Informa Acquisition Sean reflects on joining Informa, why digital and events are complementary, and how the future is about fostering true community—not just producing content or convening audiences.

46:53 – End | Rapid Fire + Closing Sean shares his favorite way to unplug (golf), what he’s reading, and Heather wraps with links to connect and learn more.