Industry Dive Is on Pace to Break $100 Million in Revenue

Business-centric newsletter publisher Industry Dive is on pace to generate between $105 and $110 million in revenue this year, a testament to the value of stitching together pockets of niche readership into a sustainable audience. The publisher has a network of 53 business-centric newsletters serving 22 different industries. They reach 2.5 million free subscribers through its mix of 25 daily and 28 weekly email products, and the average open rate across the portfolio is 30%, according to chief executive officer Sean Griffey. The average open rate for newsletters in media and publishing is 22%, according to Mailchimp. The publisher, which turned 10 years old in January, launched in 2012 and has been profitable since 2014. Since 2019, revenue has risen from $29 million to $60 million to $85 million, Griffey said. Last year, it recorded a 30% profit margin before adjusting for income tax, depreciation, depletion and amortization. “For us, the strategy was to find valuable people and aggregate them,” Griffey said. “Even though they're going to be smaller audiences, they will be valuable, and to achieve scale we just had to do that multiple times.” Industry Dive CEO Sean Griffey and his team have strict criteria for determining new industries to cover. Industry Dive caters to business professionals across fields including construction, waste management, retail and biopharmaceuticals, but the branding and design of the newsletters are uniform. It launches new email products in at least two industries per year, and the company has made five acquisitions since 2019, including the July 2020 purchase of a content marketing studio from content marketing service NewsCred. The success of the company is largely a byproduct of its ability to execute a time-tested playbook for business media, said Brian Morrissey, a media analyst and author of The Rebooting newsletter. It attracts an underserved audience of business professionals with its niche, free content, then connects that readership with brand partners looking to influence their purchase behavior. “Industry Dive knows who it is and who it isn't,” Morrissey said. “In this industry, there is a lot of noise and a constant temptation to chase shiny objects. Sean and his team have admirably not paid attention to any of that.” As Newsletter Advertising Grows, Advertisers Opt for Quality Over Quantity Revenue is almost exclusively through advertising The 320-person media company generates more than half of its revenue from a mix of direct-sold sponsorships—which lend themself to more consultative conversations—and banner ads, a third from branded content and the remaining from virtual events and webinars. Its most common clients are mid-level software-as-a-service firms that use the newsletters to promote their products to decision-makers in niche industries. The makers of human resources, payroll and shipping software are particularly frequent clients. By building a newsletter-based business from the beginning, Industry Dive has run on first-party data since its inception, making it a reliable option for marketers looking to park their spend in a safe bet, said LiveIntent chief product officer Mano Pillai. “The logged-in email inventory that Industry Dive can deliver its advertisers has only the walled gardens as its rival,” Pillai said. “You have to log in to read your email, it’s measurable and targetable and that’s becoming even more of a premium as targeting that relies on third-party data faces an uncertain future.” The templated newsletter leads to a number of operational efficiencies, sales teams can sell across all of its products, minimizing technical lift, Griffey said. And when Industry Dive adds a new business feature, such as its branded content arm, it can apply that feature across all of its properties, multiplying its value. Generating nearly all of its revenue from some form of advertising is a potential vulnerability, according to David Clinch, head of global partnerships at Mather Economics. Industry Dive aims to expand more meaningfully into events after the pandemic subsides, but even then it runs the risk of relying too heavily on only a handful of revenue streams. “Digital advertising is pretty healthy right now, so it looks like a great model on the surface,” Clinch said. “But any one-dimensional revenue stream makes you vulnerable.” Using specific criteria to find new markets Although Industry Dive has spread into a variety of disparate industries, the company uses a fixed set of criteria to determine whether it should enter a market. The newsletter network targets industries that have been disrupted by technology or regulation, because the change creates a need for up-to-date information on the market, Griffey said. It also looks for industries with high-capital expenditure, such as the electric utility industry, as that means other companies in the ecosystem will have marketing budgets dedicated to influencing that spending. Industry Dive also targets industries with trade shows, as the conventions serve as a proxy for existing markets, complete with attendees (potential readers) and vendors (potential advertisers). And the company prefers unconsolidated markets since more competition means more advertisers. “A lot of media companies are looking for the latest and greatest thing, but a lot of business media is just executing a smart strategy,” Morrissey said. “Industry Dive has a system to determine which markets they enter and how they execute on it, and they do it.” Axios Pro Deal Newsletters Launch, Starting at $599 Annually

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Business Newsletter Industry Dive Is on Pace to Break $100 Million in Revenue

The 10-year-old publisher reaches 2.5 million free email subscribers

Mark Stenberg

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