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UFC on Fox: The importance & need of growing the right demographic for future expansion

By Zach Arnold | September 19, 2011

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The reaction on social media circles, amongst MMA fans mind you, was about 95%/5% in terms of fans responding to what Floyd Mayweather did on Saturday night as opposed to what Jake Ellenberger did in beating Jake Shields. In fact, I’m probably being generous in that 95/5 ratio. Floyd Mayweather managed to suck all the non-football conversational oxygen in the room. Mayweather’s performance proved that boxing can still attract mainstream sports attention and do so in a much larger & more significant manner than anything UFC is able to accomplish.

A major key in why a big boxing fight can still command attention is due in part to the nature of the audience it attracts versus the nature of UFC’s audience. UFC’s audience, at least many casual fans, are more entertainment/pro-wrestling fans than they are sports fans. When you combine that with the fact that there is still a lacking of traditional sports media covering MMA and what you get is a niche within a niche. Mayweather’s fight with Victor Ortiz proved an ability to attract casual sports fans. The hype for the PPV was built upon large media platforms with significant scope & leverage. UFC has not been a benefactor of such support… until now.

There are many reasons the November 12th Anaheim fight between Cain Velasquez & Junior dos Santos is a critical starting point for UFC. Besides the fact that it’s a major fight on network television, it’s being promoted on a platform that has experience in promoting sports. Spike TV, for all the deeds they did for Zuffa, is not in the same league. Fox Sports is supporting UFC in a manner which CBS was not willing to back Pro Elite & Gary Shaw. When Pro Elite & Strikeforce events aired on CBS Saturday nights, it was CBS Entertainment and not CBS Sports backing those MMA events. The amount & quality of the promotion that CBS Entertainment gave to MMA was rather… underwhelming.

Fox Sports has lots of platforms to promote UFC under. They have college football on the regional sports networks (RSNs), on FX, and on the network television side. They have a web site with a healthy amount of eyeballs viewing content. The newspaper & digital media support Fox can lend to UFC is something that the company has not seen up until this point.

I mention all of these points because I was struck by just how awesome of a character Floyd Mayweather is in terms of drawing fan interest, both good & bad. He can pull in the average football or baseball fan and convince them every 16 months to shell out the cash on PPV to watch him. He makes a ton of money. It may not be ‘good’ for the sport of boxing in terms of overall health, but the vehicle that is boxing can still significantly outdraw MMA any day for a major prize fight.

The growth of UFC on Fox over the next seven years is going to be critical for the lifeblood of this industry. In additional to keep the current fan base that they already have, Zuffa needs to exponentially grow their amount of support amongst mainstream sports fans. Despite 2011 being a largely transitional year for UFC, it feels like the company has currently hit a glass ceiling (thanks in part due to the inordinate amount of PPVs, something Dana White for years railed against when it came to boxing promoters). In order for the ceiling to get shattered, the demographics and core audience for UFC needs to change significantly.

What makes the November 12th fight with Velasquez & dos Santos so intriguing is that, on paper, it looks like a healthy risk to take. It’s two lighter Heavyweights, both with power, for a title belt in front of the same crowd in which Velasquez beat Brock Lesnar last year. It was the Anaheim audience that brought into the “Brown pride” marketing. Despite the Honda Center being scaled down reportedly due to attendance concerns, I would expect a large & vociferous crowd for the show. The question is what kind of fans will show up for the event — will it be a new demographic that’s curious to watch a UFC show for the first time because it’s on Fox or will it be the conventional audience that UFC draws for the big fights?

UFC knows there’s a lot at stake for the November 12th fight and, yet, they need to somehow manage expectations so that the bar isn’t set too high for what is deemed ‘success’ versus ‘failure.’ One of the more unique aspects of Velasquez’s push last year against Brock Lesnar is that Cain, according to Dave Meltzer, was able to bring new Latino fans into the fold. However, the demographic Cain attracted was primarily English-speaking Hispanic households. Conversely, some fans that normally bought Brock’s big fights didn’t buy the one with Velasquez. Did the “Brown pride” and “first Mexican Heavyweight champion” marketing turn off some MMA fans that otherwise would have watched the title fight?

With UFC big shows on Fox, we’re going to see many of these questions amplified on a significant level. Both Velasquez & JDS need to be on Fox because they have largely been placed behind a PPV firewall and need all the over-the-air television exposure they can get. They are still not major stars and there are big question marks for both fighters heading into the November 12th fight. Can either guy carry a promotion and become a breakout star? How will being on Fox platforms change the way UFC develops new talent and new stars? Can the company manage to attract the imagination of the sports fan at-large in the United States to become more than just a niche sport?

After watching the Floyd Mayweather circus on Saturday night, I’m extremely fascinated to see if UFC & Fox can develop an MMA star that will command the… star power… that we still see on occasion for a big boxing match.

**

Here’s an ESPN Sports Science profile on Jon “Bones” Jones, who fights Rampage Jackson on Saturday in Denver. I thought their ‘hype session’ on Spike with Rogan was goofy and not exactly the kind of thing that will motivate people to be interested in the fight. What does interest me is a motivated Rampage, however. Is everyone still sure that Jones is worthy of being a 5-to-1 favorite heading into the fight?

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 37 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

37 Responses to “UFC on Fox: The importance & need of growing the right demographic for future expansion”

  1. Adam says:

    It’s a bit harsh to compare the media footprint of one of boxing’s biggest and most controversial events, to one of the UFC’s smallest and least spectacular. But you still make a valid point.

    However, it’s worth noting why the UFC is at such a media disadvantage to boxing, and what it is doing right to rectify that.

    In the UK at least, much of boxing’s media coverage is self-serving. It is largely disproportionate to the public interest and doesn’t act to inform and serve a market, but rather to advertise the business interests of that media outlet’s parent company. (e.g. The Sun/ Mail/ Times print a story > Sky news have an interview > all owned by newscorp > who own Sky box office who are selling the fight.) This is obvious by the massive difference in media coverage between fights on Sky box office (Haye v Harrison) compared to ones which aren’t (Pacquiao/Mayweather/Klitschko fights). It also explains why MMA struggles for anything other than bad publicity from old-media which has significant boxing ties.

    The success of Sky box office’s PPV approach doesn’t come from a large, existing fanbase, but one it generates shortly before the fight due to sheer publicity which cashes in on the public desire for combat sports. No boxing fan would be more exited for Haye v Harrison than a Pacquiao or Mayweather fight, but with the right publicity (like promoting a totally fabricated personal feud), someone who just wants to watch a fight will be.

    Of course, that all makes money and there’s no doubt the UFC would want to cash in on the simple desire to watch fights. And with the UFC on Fox deal they are approaching the mass market in a much better way than boxing has in a very long time. Especially with the calibre of fight they are putting on that show. A PPV approach doesn’t really help growth, but the sheer scale of the Fox deal will give the UFC a huge publicity boost, exposing the sport to a new market. And while this may not have an instant impact, it is certainly breaking the ice in a considerable way which will make future shows even bigger events.

    That is a growth that even boxing’s biggest stars will be hugely jealous of. And I have no doubt that while boxing’s current stars fade, and the sport continues to suffer negative growth, MMA will grow. It may not instantly shoot up into the mainstream like some seem to expect, but it is certainly heading in the right direction.

    • cutch says:

      Despite doing great buys for Haye-Klitchko, Sky are out the PPV game until 2013, probably because Sky Sports costs so much for a subscription and the Boxing (and Strikeforce) are now on Prime time and I’m guessing even Amir Khan is doing horrible buys.

      The UFC need to get on Sky Sports though, despite it being more expensive than ESPN UK, they have a far greater reach and also the Sky Sports News channel that they can promote shows on.

      Obviously The UFC would want to try PPV but they probably could’nt get away with more than 4 a year and they would have to be their Vegas or stadium shows

      • 45 Huddle says:

        I assume you live in the UK. Can you explain to me exactly how television is structured in that country? How much of it is free versus pay? And how much are the pay services?

        • cutch says:

          You first have to buy a yearly TV licence to watch “free” TV, then get Sky or Virgin TV subscription. Then you have to pay for your Sports package if you want to watch the top sports that are’nt on free TV.

          It really depends on the package you choose but you are on average looking at £20 for all of Sky Sports (1-4 and News)and £10 for ESPN & ESPN America,

          I pay £29 for all the sports channels and basically only get ESPN for the UFC (which does pretty good ratings)but they show all the US sports besides the NFL and the bottom tier English Premier games as well as European Soccer leagues.

          Sky Sports has the MUCH better sports coverage and ESPN seems happy to be number 2 as Sky Sports is’nt able to have all the Premier League TV rights.

  2. 45 Huddle says:

    1) Boxing draws 2 or 3 times a year. It is hardly anything to want to emulate. And even the promoters themselves know that their fanbase is aging and they missed out at that younger fanbase to the UFC. Now it’s just time before boxing is really sniffed out. Rome didn’t crumble in a day….

    2) If you grew up on The Karate Kid, the new version with Will Smith’s son seems unnecessary and pointless. It’s not “your” Karate Kid. But if you were 8 when this movie came out, this new version is your reality. Jayden Smith is The Karate Kid. And as that 8 year old gets older and has kids, he is more likely to show his children the Jayden Smith version. But that takes an entire generational shift.

    That is really all that the UFC is missing out on right now. It’s a purely time thing. They have made all of the right steps. They are on FOX and FX. That will slowly be integrated into the mainstream over time just like the rest of the major sports.

    But it’s going to take old people dying and young people having children to really make a bigger difference.

    Boxing has multiple generations to grow upon. But they lost the war for the key 18-34 current demographic. They lost that foundation.

    We live in a society where people think things will happen overnight. The US economy will get better overnight. The UFC will become big overnight. That’s not how things work. These are things that take years.

    Zuffa has layed the foundation and now just need to continue to put in the hard work to attract the eyeballs. It will happen. Just don’t expect a miracle on Nov 12th.

    But the people watching on Nov 12th…. Those people will be the start….

    • Zach Arnold says:

      1) Boxing draws 2 or 3 times a year. It is hardly anything to want to emulate. And even the promoters themselves know that their fanbase is aging and they missed out at that younger fanbase to the UFC. Now it’s just time before boxing is really sniffed out. Rome didn’t crumble in a day….

      I don’t think anyone is suggesting that UFC adopt the boxing business model full-bore. However, it is entirely fair to point out that when it comes to reaching a zenith for attention from the mainstream sports public, a big boxing fight blows a big UFC event out of the water.

      The Fox deal is the first legitimate platform UFC has to try to win over that kind of fan, which is why I wrote what I did here.

      • 45 Huddle says:

        Boxing writers generation still controls the newspapers and TV media. This is why they have such a reach.

        The UFC’s fanbase is on the internet. And the internet alone is not big enough to push the UFC to the next level. That is what FOX is for.

        Football wasn’t the biggest sport in America 25 years ago. It layed in the shadows of baseball, hockey, and basketball.

        I’m not saying that the UFC will ever become as big as football. It won’t. I just think it’s going to take many many years to increase popularity like it took with the NFL.

        All I know is that MMA is on the right track and boxing is on the wrong track. And that means these two sports will be in very different positions in even one generation change in this country….

        • Nottheface says:

          Believe me, as a kid who spent his teens in the 80s in front of the TV watching the NFL, football was already the biggest sport in America at that time. Or at worst, neck and neck with baseball.

        • Jonathan Snowden says:

          “Football wasn’t the biggest sport in America 25 years ago. It layed in the shadows of baseball, hockey, and basketball.”

          That’s preposterous. 87 million people watched the Super Bowl that year. The television rights reaped more than baseball’s, although a huge deal with ESPN was right around the corner for MLB.

          In 1986, the first game of the Eastern Conference Finals wasn’t even carried on national television. Football was huge. Basketball was just beginning its growth. Only baseball compared.

        • edub says:

          “Football wasn’t the biggest sport in America 25 years ago. It layed in the shadows of baseball, hockey, and basketball.”

          Replace 25 with 35, and you might have an argument.

        • nottheface says:

          Edub, not even in the 70s was the NHL or NBA in the NFL’s category. Since post WWII the NFL has been at worst 2nd place to MLB, being ranked even above college football, And since the late 70s it has probably been the number one sporting attraction in the America.

        • edub says:

          I was giving him the benefit of the doubt, because I didn’t want to bother with looking up the numbers, and he did say baseball as part of that statement.

          Not surprised.

        • 45 Huddle says:

          Perhaps 25 years wasn’t the correct number…. But when the Super Bowl first started… mid 1960’s… it was getting around 25 Million viewers. Baseball was doing around 40 Million during that same time period.

          Within a generation, that changed. Nothing changed overnight. It takes one generation to die off and the next one to show their children what they love to really make a big difference.

          Heck, if you look at where boxing was in the 1970’s compared to today, it’s a sad sad story. Boxing went from ABC Sports to now being happy if 1 Million people watch them on a pay channel. The decline has already taken place. The final nail in the coffin will just be a long up and down process when all of those fans are gone.

        • Alan Conceicao says:

          Football was the biggest pro sport well within a generation of the Super Bowl’s creation. In fact, it was indisputably the most popular pro sport within about an Olympic cycle of the Super Bowl’s creation. The Super Bowl is basically what put the NFL and the pro version of the sport over the top on a buildup that dated back to the Colts/Giants game in ’58. They’ve never looked back

  3. Chris says:

    Zach,

    I think you hit on all the major points as to why Boxing major Boxing events continue to do well. The fact that most most Boxing fans are sports fans, is not something that should be dismissed.

  4. I do not watch boxing, but I know enough about it to comment as a casual observer.

    Going on YouTube to see the reaction to the Mayweather cheap shot, about 50% of the responses (and I scrolled through hundreds) made reference to the WWE, and thought it was a work. Around 45% were flat out disgusted with Mayweather. And about 5% were defending him, saying it was completely fair.

    My impression of the fight is that it put a HUGE black eye on the sport. Ortiz was laughing and joking around? Right after he lost the biggest fight of his career?! If the fighters don’t even care about the outcome, why should WE care? It seems like they just want to collect a paycheck and go home. In the UFC you get the feeling that everything is on the line in a big fight, and they put their heart and soul into it.

    I personally don’t know a single person who has ever purchased a boxing PPV, so this is clearly not a conversation for Canadians – if you saw the crowd in the Skydome you know what sport we prefer 🙂

    But as far as I can tell, once Pac-Man and Mayweather retire, I don’t see many people retaining any sort of interest in boxing.

    • MK says:

      Boxing has an established fanbase that won’t just disappear. In fact boxing and MMA both enjoy a lot of internet support so there are plenty of young people, especially from ethnic backgrounds, that will continue to support it.

      MMA needs to move on from its fascination of beating boxing and converting its fans. Frankly, if I was only an MMA fan I would feel slighted because of all the boxing content which flooded the MMA internet world this past weekend. This article is interesting but if my favorite boxing blog began to cover next weekends UFC PPV like bloodyelbow covered the Mayweather fight, I would stop going there.

    • Light23 says:

      “If the fighters don’t even care about the outcome, why should WE care?” PS. how do you quote properly?!

      This is what I took away from that fight. As a 5 year diehard MMA fan, this is the first boxing PPV I have ever bought, even though there was a UFC show on the same night.

      At the end of it, it just seemed like the whole show didn’t matter. The commentators talked about how Morales was shot and would’ve previously destroyed this opponent within minutes. I have little interest in seeing Alvarez again.

      Then in the main event, Floyd had no problems winning via sucker punch, when his opponent wasn’t even looking at him. Ortiz seemed amused and just glad that he got the exposure.

      In the end, the fight, while entertaining, was just a big nothing. It felt like a moneymaking exercise, not a competition to see who was the best.

      Boxing is entertaining, but I can’t really see a future for it past Pacquiao and Mayweather.

      • MK says:

        Morales and Alvarez are big names and even the opening fight was a good match up (although a bad decision). Top to bottom it was a good PPV with a disappointing finish, which unfortunately is taking away from what was turning out to be a masterclass performance by an ATG against the #3 in the division.

        You might not care about anyone else then Pac and Floyd but boxing fans do care. The same way the general public won\’t know anyone outside of Brock and GSP.

        • edub says:

          Exactly.

          MMA fans live in sort of a bubble where they think since they don’t know the other names on the boxing cards, nobody does.

          However top to bottom it was not a good PPV. It’s not entirely their fault because if Matthysse would have been healthy it would have had two decent fights, but since he had to pull out Morales got stuck with an overmatched opponent. That coupled with Alvarez taking a backstep fighting Gomez, it left much to be desired from the undercard (even with the good prospect vs. prospect starter).

      • Chuck says:

        “Boxing is entertaining, but I can’t really see a future for it past Pacquiao and Mayweather.”

        You’re kidding, right? Alright, so you don’t care about Saul Alvarez, fine. But did you not hear his reaction? He is HUGE amongst Mexican fans. He is way more popular than any MMA fighter not named GSP or Brock Lesnar, that is damn certain.

        Otherwise, MK and edub nailed it on the head contradicting your post.

        But one thing I do disagree with MK on…..you thought the Lopez/Vargas fight was a bad decision? No way! Vargas won that fight. I had it 95-94. Harold Lederman himself had it 96-93. Lopez threw and landed some huge shots, but Vargas otherswise outboxed him down the stretch.

        • Fluyid says:

          There always seems to be stars on the rise. It wasn’t that long ago when people were saying that boxing was done once de la Hoya retired. It’s always like this.

          Anyway, there are some potential stars out there….. guys like Jose Benevidez, for example… who will replace today’s stars. It always seems to go on and on.

          As for Lederman, I’ve watched him “judge” fights for HBO in person and he does nothing of the sort. He watches fights and is engaged with the commentators. He’s sitting with the announce crew and has headphones on and listens in with them. It’s just not the same as judging. When you judge, you’re totally alone and focused on the action. You don’t listen to commentary and interact with others. You sit and watch, focused and isolated.

          Duane Ford has even made statements about Lederman and his job as the “judge” for HBO… let’s just say that Lederman performs a judge-like role for the on-air voice talent at HBO Boxing. All I’m saying is that he’s not the great authority on what a score should be. Heck, some people say that Joe Cortez was once a good ref. I suppose Lederman used to be a good judge, but I don’t know that to be a fact.

  5. Jason Harris says:

    Boxing has an entrenched audience of older fans who just like “boxing” and don’t really care who’s fighting beyond “Guy I kind of heard of” or the ever so classy race war marketing that boxing loves to use for almost all of it’s big fights. UFC getting popular doesn’t evaporate that tomorrow, and in a world where boxing promoters got their shit together they would both coexist doing good business. But this is a world where boxing promoters go for that one big flashy payday every 16 months while nobody pays attention to any of it in the interim. UFC won’t kill boxing, boxing will kill itself and it doesn’t need UFC’s help to do it.

    • Steve4192 says:

      “Boxing has an entrenched audience of older fans”

      Only in one particular demographic (Caucasians). There are plenty of young boxing fans among the other ethnic groups. MMA has the opposite demographics. It draws in young Caucasian males and has almost no presence among other ethnic groups.

      For all the talk about how MMA is the future due to it’s demographics, there is one demographic no one mentions …. the Caucasian population is shrinking relative to other ethnic groups, and boxing owns those other ethnic groups.

  6. nottheface says:

    For all the talk of boxing’s eminent demise it is worth noting that the four biggest prize fights of the year will most likely be boxing matches.

  7. I would argue that from a financial standpoint, GSP vs. Shields WAS a big superfight.

    I think to make some BIG fights, they need to give Anderson some competition. If he fought GSP (of course) it would do insane PPV numbers, but I think they need to have him vs. Jones, Rashad or Shogun to make it a real fight and generate fan interest.

    • edub says:

      GSP vs. Anderson still wouldn’t come close to a Mayweather or Pacman PPV. Frankly, it still wouldn’t sell worldwide on the level of Haye-Klitschko.

  8. Liger05 says:

    Even with all the BS that has happened in boxing I still get more hyped for a big boxing fight than a big UFC one.

    • 45 Huddle says:

      That’s because there are 20 “big” MMA events a year and about 3 “big” boxing events a year.

      I used to get so much more pumped for the UFC when they were running 6 shows a year.

  9. liger05 says:

    It’s nothing to do with that. Ufc just doesn’t pull me like boxing does.

  10. Fluyid says:

    I don’t have much to add to the above discussion, but I have to say that tons of people at my office today were talking about Mayweather. That KO over Ortiz is only going to hype a future matchup with Pacquiao that much more. He really couldn’t have done much more to raise the Mayweather hatred….. unless he pulled out a gun and shot a baby in the audience after he was done berating Larry Merchant.

    I suppose it’s the entertainment business at its core and Mayweather has now fully created a character that millions want to see get beat down. Maybe I’m wrong, but a Mayweather vs. Pacquiao fight will create a hype and mainstream following the likes of which we haven’t seen in years and years. People really HATE Mayweather.

  11. liger05 says:

    Mayweather is a killer heel. The way the fight went down, the interview with merchant and the post fight presser was just killer. People will continue to pay to watch floyd lose. Love him or hate him his done damn well to get himself into a position where his the biggest draw in the game.

  12. Zack says:

    The Mayweather sucker punch and Merchant banter was some of the best pro wrasslin I’ve seen since Wrestlewar ’89.

  13. David m says:

    I was in NYC this weekend and I must have heard half a dozen casual conversations about the fight and the controversy. Mma still isn’t big amongst Latino and black communities both because of the rich boxing history in their cultures, and because of grappling being deemed as gay, and the strong streak of homophobia in those particular cultures. Before anyone calls me a racist, I had a class in law school about the legal challenges facing the LGBT community, and one thing I saw concerned the statistics on violence towards the LGBT community broken down by race. In the black and Latino communities, the likelihood of attacks on LGBT people was much higher than in white communities. This I think reflects a general disgust towards homosexuals in those communities, and certainly seeing two men lying on top of each other does not seem as masculine and tough as boxing.

  14. darkmader says:

    The Floyd vs Merchant was so great on so many levels. The true boxing fans wanted to say the same thing to him but of course not the way Floyd said it.

    50 years younger he’d tap that ass?!?!? That was a great laugh.

    We should talk about MMA and how as Meltzer as broke it down this whole year, that MMA is dead now.

    GSP is the only draw. The #’s will be mixed with Dec 30th but honestly nobody is talking about how MMA might be dead in the next 5 years. Some dude on belbow said MMA need a heel like Floyd and I agree, we have Kos, but he’s not at that level.

  15. darkmader says:

    Dana actually believes that in the next 20 years that MMA will be the biggest sport out there (not football, come onO

    He said it best though. You roll down 4 street corners and watch it for a sec. You have football (USA soccer) afer t hat then baseball. Of course you have basketball all over the place and like in the northern States and Canada it\’s hockey.

    If a person went to all of those blocks, which one would he stop and watch. There is no debate about it and if they market it right it could be the 3rd biggest sport besies Soccer of course, then the NFL, then MMA/UFC.

    The NFL is quickly becoming the No Fun League real quick with all the rule changes and you can\’t even touch a gu w/o getting a 10k fine.

    ALLLL the games i\’ve watched on fox they are promoting the UFC. I expect a 7.5 rating. It\’s a mistake to do only one fight especially if it\’s boring but Clay/Henderson will be great too but we don\’t know if that will hit the 1 hour time slot.

  16. Trust Doesn't Rust says:

    I actually thought CBS did a great job promoting the EliteXC shows. Remember Kimbo in that stupid cowboy outfit presenting at award shows and stuff like that? They also got ESPN to do features on both him and Gina. All this plus promos during football just like Fox is doing with the UFC. They definitely succeeded in creating a buzz for those events (at least the two with Kimbo).

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