Board of Governors

James Spanfeller
President and CEO, The Spanfeller Media Group

Jim Spanfeller is Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Spanfeller Media Group, a venture backed web based content company. The first site from SMG is TheDailyMeal.com and covers all things food. Off to a great start TheDailyMeal, which launched in January of 2011, has already attracted over 1 million monthly unique visitors making it the fastest growing food site on the web.

Prior to this position Jim served as the President and CEO of Forbes.com, home page for the world’s business leaders, reaching 20 million business decision makers each month. In this position, Spanfeller oversaw Forbes Digital, which included Forbes.com, ForbesTraveler.com, Investopedia.com, RealClearPolitics.com, RealClearMarkets.com, RealClearSports.com, and the Forbes.com Business and Finance Blog Network, which together reached 42 million unique monthly visitors. Spanfeller was also a member of the Office of the Chairman, along with Steve Forbes and Timothy Forbes.

Spanfeller has received numerous industry accolades. Most recently the first ever Founders Award from the IAB for lifetime achievement. He has been included in BtoB Media Business’ “Who’s Who in Business Publishing” and was named “Top Interactive Executive for General Business Publishers” as part of the “Top Innovator in Business Publishing” awards. He has also been included in BtoB magazine’s “Top 25 Newsmakers” as well as the “Media Power 50 List” at #4, and was inducted into min’s first-ever Digital Hall of Fame.

Spanfeller is currently Secretary of the Online Publisher’s Association (OPA) and is a Chairman Emeritus of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). He also sits on the boards of Ziff Davis Enterprise Group, MediaSmith LLC and The We Are Family Foundation.

In addition to these full board positions he also serves on the advisory boards of several early stage web start-ups; We7, WebMynd, TrustMetrics and Fattail are four examples.

He writes frequently in leading industry trade publications and speaks regularly throughout the world on media issues in the digital age.

Prior to joining Forbes.com, Spanfeller was President of the Consumer Magazine Group of Ziff Davis Media, Inc. Previously, he was Publisher of Inc. magazine and also held senior positions at Playboy Enterprises Publishing Group and Newsweek.

Spanfeller received a B.A. in English Literature from Union College. He lives in New York City with his wife, Peg, and their three daughters.