aftermath of Francis fight: a lesson in how corporate PR works

[don't ask]

Don’t give Shillbro the time of day, he has been exposed and can’t deal with it

lol I can't argue with this. I'm done for the night, anyways. Later!

 

[Foghorn Leghorn]

Agreed but the idea that they only monitor hardcore fans bashing their company on myriad subjects including things as possibly troubling as fighter pay, and just report back and nobody says "hey, spend an hour a day, you four, and get into those conversations on these forums" just seems far fetched.

If any of us ran a company that was getting bashed as badly as the UFC sometimes does here, we'd want to say our two cents in defense (or deflection, or distraction, or even offense).

Add to that how PETTY the UFC has been about disparate voices and there is absolutely zero question in my mind that THIS SPECIFIC COMPANY is absolutely paying ppl to post on these forums.

That said, one of the glorious things about life is that we each have our own minds and I appreciate your having your own.

You are spot on about the pettiness of the organization at times. And yeah, it's not a huge stretch to have someone get engaged like you suggested. What makes you think they really care about fighter pay? Has it budged in a positive direction because of fan backlash? I ask that question sincerely, not rhetorically. From what I can tell, they haven't much changed on their pay scales, but it's not an issue I follow very intently.

@don't ask:
I am indeed assuming that they don't rely on us as much, but I think that is a pretty fair assessment, no? They get the money from ESPN, Emirati billionaires, wherever else. I suppose they might value our interest in something like Fight Pass, which gives them a solid, consistent recurring income source based. But I don't see it's as a baseless assumption.

If they're putting in $X into this, what is their return on the investment? They make a post benefitting the company that gets 100 likes on here. I guess that's a pretty "successful" post. Well what does that do for them? Why not put that effort elsewhere with a bigger audience, where a popular tweet could be seen millions of times for example? Not to say you can't do both, but why waste the time on here when you could put that time into the next post on the bigger platform?

I'm intrigued by this if you can find it (gonna have a look myself):

There was a UFC memo that leaked 10-15 years ago about their employees posting online. It stopped short of saying, "It is your paid duty to disseminate these narratives,", but it was pretty damning.

Either way: I enjoy this topic and will definitely keep an eye out for suspicious posting in the future. Thanks to all for the insights and opinions.

 

[kflo]

You are spot on about the pettiness of the organization at times. And yeah, it's not a huge stretch to have someone get engaged like you suggested. What makes you think they really care about fighter pay? Has it budged in a positive direction because of fan backlash? I ask that question sincerely, not rhetorically. From what I can tell, they haven't much changed on their pay scales, but it's not an issue I follow very intently.

@don't ask:
I am indeed assuming that they don't rely on us as much, but I think that is a pretty fair assessment, no? They get the money from ESPN, Emirati billionaires, wherever else. I suppose they might value our interest in something like Fight Pass, which gives them a solid, consistent recurring income source based. But I don't see it's as a baseless assumption.

If they're putting in $X into this, what is their return on the investment? They make a post benefitting the company that gets 100 likes on here. I guess that's a pretty "successful" post. Well what does that do for them? Why not put that effort elsewhere with a bigger audience, where a popular tweet could be seen millions of times for example? Not to say you can't do both, but why waste the time on here when you could put that time into the next post on the bigger platform?

I'm intrigued by this if you can find it (gonna have a look myself):


Either way: I enjoy this topic and will definitely keep an eye out for suspicious posting in the future. Thanks to all for the insights and opinions.

The memo was from like 2004-2006 when the ufc was still in the red and 2nd to pride. Before twitter, before IG, before they had all the outlets they have today.

 

[don't ask]

You are spot on about the pettiness of the organization at times. And yeah, it's not a huge stretch to have someone get engaged like you suggested. What makes you think they really care about fighter pay? Has it budged in a positive direction because of fan backlash? I ask that question sincerely, not rhetorically. From what I can tell, they haven't much changed on their pay scales, but it's not an issue I follow very intently.

@don't ask:
I am indeed assuming that they don't rely on us as much, but I think that is a pretty fair assessment, no?

No. I literally just explained to you why that would make them extremely abnornal for a company like them.

They get the money from ESPN, Emirati billionaires, wherever else. I suppose they might value our interest in something like Fight Pass, which gives them a solid, consistent recurring income source based. But I don't see it's as a baseless assumption.

You're listing sources of income who either themselves astroturf online like we're describing or have parent companies that do. Think about that for a minute. You're saying they don't need to do it in this dog-eat-dog, money-driven, marketing world, but the people with more money than them do for some reason. And you're kidding yourself if you don't think that the people who are investing money in them are expecting them to do the fucking basics of commerce and marketing in 2023 to turn a profit.

If they're putting in $X into this, what is their return on the investment? They make a post benefitting the company that gets 100 likes on here. I guess that's a pretty "successful" post. Well what does that do for them? Why not put that effort elsewhere with a bigger audience, where a popular tweet could be seen millions of times for example? Not to say you can't do both, but why waste the time on here when you could put that time into the next post on the bigger platform?

This really sounds like you're being deliberately ignorant at this point. Either that or you know so little about business, marketing the internet and the world that this extreme outlier of a business decision you're describing actually makes sense to you.

I'm intrigued by this if you can find it (gonna have a look myself):

Let us know if you find it. @Dionysian have talked about it before because we were both on these boards when it happened, but we haven't been able to find it.

Either way: I enjoy this topic and will definitely keep an eye out for suspicious posting in the future. Thanks to all for the insights and opinions.

You don't need to keep an eye out for suspicious posting, you just need to keep an eye out for posting that is totally normal and expected of corporations in 2023.

 

[Foghorn Leghorn]

The memo was from like 2004-2006 when the ufc was still in the red and 2nd to pride. Before twitter, before IG, before they had all the outlets they have today.

Ah ok. Was gonna say, I feel like I would remember this if it was in my time. I was a fan as a young kid, fell out for awhile before getting back into it in 2006 after TUF had blown up (I sorta half followed but didn't watch during that point, cared more about WWE).

To me, influencing Sherdog back then would have been much more valuable than nowadays. On the original subject of this thread, if I were to attempt to spin something it would be to build up both of Aspinall and Pavlovich ahead of their fight, then when whoever wins, especially if impressively: "Look how awesome (winner) is. Ngannou might be a good puncher, but he wrestled Gane because he couldn't trade with him. It meant nothing and (winner) would beat him anyways because they're harder to take down. Time to move on, he's almost 40, he's only got a couple good years left at most."

@don't ask
I had a look for the story, but didn't see anything on Google. I'm not familiar enough with it to have many specific keywords to look for. Was it something that was on Sherdog back in the day? The Underground?

Don't you worry though, I'm not ruling out me being ig'nant or naive though. Anyhoo, gotta check out for the evening as well

 

[nonoob]

Dionysian has presented a pretty compelling case, as far as this sort of thing could be proven.

Great thread !
​

Quite a few posts seem like "some doth protest too much" as that Will Shakes guy said a while back.

 

[MigitAs]

Legendary thread

 

[mudrubble]

You are spot on about the pettiness of the organization at times. And yeah, it's not a huge stretch to have someone get engaged like you suggested. What makes you think they really care about fighter pay? Has it budged in a positive direction because of fan backlash? I ask that question sincerely, not rhetorically. From what I can tell, they haven't much changed on their pay scales, but it's not an issue I follow very intently.

@don't ask:
I am indeed assuming that they don't rely on us as much, but I think that is a pretty fair assessment, no? They get the money from ESPN, Emirati billionaires, wherever else. I suppose they might value our interest in something like Fight Pass, which gives them a solid, consistent recurring income source based. But I don't see it's as a baseless assumption.

If they're putting in $X into this, what is their return on the investment? They make a post benefitting the company that gets 100 likes on here. I guess that's a pretty "successful" post. Well what does that do for them? Why not put that effort elsewhere with a bigger audience, where a popular tweet could be seen millions of times for example? Not to say you can't do both, but why waste the time on here when you could put that time into the next post on the bigger platform?

I'm intrigued by this if you can find it (gonna have a look myself):


Either way: I enjoy this topic and will definitely keep an eye out for suspicious posting in the future. Thanks to all for the insights and opinions.

I don't think they care about fighter pay - I think they care about their reputation! And if the hardcore/most knowledgeable fans have gripes, and we are the main independent source from which casual fans take advice (other voices are largely already under UFC control, to a degree), then casuals come on board and cite things hardcore fans say in order to seem to be in the know.

I've talked to tons of casuals and they have largely asked a lot of questions and taken a lot of perspective from me - much more than vice versa. I don't think it's ideal for the UFC to have the most knowledgeable consumers of their product advising their casuals about their problems in all their details. At least not if an alternative exists. And it does. It's simple PR. Counterprogramming. They would be negligent not to be utilizing it here.

I don't see why allowing a cancer to grow is ever preferable to some measure of treatment. It's not like it costs a fortune to have a few ppl on staff with forum duties as part of their responsibilities. A lot of MMA memes and narratives originate from this place.

 

[dnmb]

Good hypothesis

Now do big tech, the Bank and governments

 

[HeffDoesWant]

Amazingly accurate breakdown of how smear campaigns roll out online. Your post reads like a playbook I’ve seen unfold from the inside, back when I was heading up marcomm for a big corp, and now as the marketing head for a mid-sized outfit.

This forum has been an extension of UFC PR since it was bought from Jeff Sherwood. That’s why there is an army of UFC shills here. I’ve thrown shade at the UFC PR department right here before, predicting their replacement by bots and AI (which, let’s be real, is just a matter of time). The angry and passionate response I got could only have come from someone who had their work questioned and job threatened .

Spot on about @kflo and @markg171. Their posts are like a UFC praise echo chamber.

Unfortunately your prediction of what will happen in the Francis/Fury aftermath is very likely. It’s a clear-cut showcase of how the PR machine swings into action to mold the narrative. Your step-by-step walkthrough from the event to the narrative adoption is both sad and amazingly accurate. It’s frustrating seeing how the corporate narrative seeps into forums and becomes the “fan” narrative over time.

Your post is a serious reality check and a call for everyone to question the “popular” narratives being thrown around here.

The most obvious ufc bias on Sherdog is the main mma fight discussion thread is purely ufc.

 

[joeson]

The most obvious ufc bias on Sherdog is the main mma fight discussion thread is purely ufc.

100%. It relegates discussions of fights outside of the UFC to rarely frequently forums. Is this an MMA board or a UFC board? Surprised they let all the Fury/Ngannou posts stay. They moved all of the posts to the boxing forum prior to the fight. Don’t think they did that leading up to the Mayweather vs McGregor fight, though.

 

[Dionysian]

Legendary thread

Took a few days but inexplicably moved to LWs by a mod. Not holding my breath for any mod to explain why the fuck it is that 100 threads about Conor's toenail stay up indefinitely but a serious discussion of the UFC is moved into oblivion. I predicted this shit in my OP however. All it takes is one compromised mod...

Hey mods: Any attempt at a justification for why this thread about UFC PR shouldn't be in the UFC forum???

And @Dionysian , I would be curious to hear your take on the why aspect of this. Like I said earlier, I agree that this stuff goes on but it seems to me like something that would not be a fruitful expenditure for a company, even a very wealthy one like the UFCWWE merger. It seems too small of a scale, like it would not be worth the money spent to try to influence a narrative on this small of a scale without it spreading to a more broad crowd.

Is Sherdog that influential? Maybe once upon a time, but nowadays? I'm not sure, truly. The USADA stuff is compelling, particularly participating for 60 pages in a thread. I have been involved in some serious clan flame wars back in the day playing games online, and not small forums either; 60 pages is a lot.

I guess what I'm saying is: why do it here, and why not on places like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook? Not to say they couldn't do both, but why waste the money (and time) on here? What kind of returns do you think they're getting out of trying to influence here? Are there narratives formed here that have travelled elsewhere?

I've had an account for a long time now I guess. I would have been a lurker in '09 before making an account later on. I've never really been active enough to know too many names too closely, though people who have had the same name/profile pics for a long time I'm a little familiar with. There was probably a few years where I was more engaged.

Side note: Used to post on the forums of a site called MMA TKO (was a site where they'd post the fights after they happened) if anyone remembers it. This place was too busy back then, so I went there.

It is more appropriate to ask "why not" IMO. When you pay a guy at a restaurant to specifically clean he cleans everything, not just the front door. Because if not, then what is he getting paid for? Likewise, when you pay for PR you pay to get any influence you can, and a multi-billion dollar org worth anything wants any influence it can get, period. UFC tries to influence social media giants, of course, but also Sherdog.

On the topic of Sherdog specifically, they absolutely pay attention, yes. Hardcores are a minority but a vocal one. It'd be stupid for them not to pay attention to hardcore sentiment. Just one real life example: there have been multiple fights announced that go to a Sherdog poll where the fight received tremendous ridicule/hardcore backlash as a stupid match. In short order the fight is cancelled by the UFC... again, they'd be stupid not to pay attention to fan sentiment. Sherdog is useful in that it is a sounding board for ideas, which is why they do it exactly the way they do it (announcement / analyze response / react). They do it on a larger scale with non-fights too. Khabib at 229 is a good example. They announced possibly taking the belt based on a "governor had to run for his life" narrative. The fans and media lambasted them for it for a few weeks. Dana then publicly and disappointingly said something like "I guess people just didn't think it was that big of a deal" and then backed off the talk of taking the belt away. Of course the context of the time was that Khabib was not seen as a star yet and they wanted to effectively undo their golden boy's loss. But once they saw their narrative clearly failed and was even garnering Khabib more support, they bolted on the notion.

 

[Dionysian]

EXHIBIT A:
kflo makes 60+ pages worth of posts, spamming URL links with ideal formatting and indentation. All 60 pages are about metabolite science.

EXHIBIT B:

Yeah. You’re just an anonymous asshole. Feel proud.

You write like an asshole. Congrats.

You disagree with someone and this is the role you happily play. You’d be embarrassed to even type out what you think was so offensive to you.

Shitposters unite. Welcome herb.

You’re just an online asshole in addition to team CT?

Just know you're asking a lunatic his opinion on how things work in the real world….

Again you’re just the kind of guy who chooses his online persona to be an asshole. Congrats. I don’t remember having 2 discussions with you.

Gee whiz looks like a different writing style or something. Almost like he is copying/pasting the professional responses or something.

 

[kflo]

EXHIBIT A:
kflo makes 60+ pages worth of posts, spamming URL links with ideal formatting and indentation. All 60 pages are about metabolite science.

EXHIBIT B:






Gee whiz looks like a different writing style or something. Almost like he is copying/pasting the professional responses or something.

will your whole world crumble when you see i use the same writing style in the war room?

 

[J Danger]

will your whole world crumble when you see i use the same writing style in the war room?

idk, man. You denied a lot of stuff in here that he had receipts for. What’s the explanation for that?

 

[kflo]

idk, man. You denied a lot of stuff in here that he had receipts for. What’s the explanation for that?

he's got no receipts. go read the threads if you're interested.

 

[MigitAs]

Took a few days but inexplicably moved to LWs by a mod. Not holding my breath for any mod to explain why the fuck it is that 100 threads about Conor's toenail stay up indefinitely but a serious discussion of the UFC is moved into oblivion. I predicted this shit in my OP however. All it takes is one compromised mod...

Hey mods: Any attempt at a justification for why this thread about UFC PR shouldn't be in the UFC forum???


It is more appropriate to ask "why not" IMO. When you pay a guy at a restaurant to specifically clean he cleans everything, not just the front door. Because if not, then what is he getting paid for? Likewise, when you pay for PR you pay to get any influence you can, and a multi-billion dollar org worth anything wants any influence it can get, period. UFC tries to influence social media giants, of course, but also Sherdog.

On the topic of Sherdog specifically, they absolutely pay attention, yes. Hardcores are a minority but a vocal one. It'd be stupid for them not to pay attention to hardcore sentiment. Just one real life example: there have been multiple fights announced that go to a Sherdog poll where the fight received tremendous ridicule/hardcore backlash as a stupid match. In short order the fight is cancelled by the UFC... again, they'd be stupid not to pay attention to fan sentiment. Sherdog is useful in that it is a sounding board for ideas, which is why they do it exactly the way they do it (announcement / analyze response / react). They do it on a larger scale with non-fights too. Khabib at 229 is a good example. They announced possibly taking the belt based on a "governor had to run for his life" narrative. The fans and media lambasted them for it for a few weeks. Dana then publicly and disappointingly said something like "I guess people just didn't think it was that big of a deal" and then backed off the talk of taking the belt away. Of course the context of the time was that Khabib was not seen as a star yet and they wanted to effectively undo their golden boy's loss. But once they saw their narrative clearly failed and was even garnering Khabib more support, they bolted on the notion.

You’re solid gold in my books and I won’t forget

 

[Striker Fox]

Whatever kind of a joke you're trying to make... it isn't working man.

5. Narrative adoption: this is the end goal. In the first few days your employees plant the narratives and they're the ones doing the bulk of posting (IF there is no organic fan hate... this case being a rare example of that!), but a month later (if it works) the employees are no longer posting and then 80-IQ fans begin to parrot the narratives. That is why no bashing narrative existed for Francis last night: there is ZERO organic bashing. There will be more bashing a month from now, but THEN the bulk of that posting will NOT be employees... it will be predominantly the moron fans that parroted the talking points being planted now

Joke? It's your own narrative adoption theory. Whoever you disagree with is a shill. Whoever you agree with is a great poster.

I agree, @acannxr is a good poster, just bringing your double standard and bias to your attention

 

[headlessTao]

Anyone who thinks this notion is ridiculous is being naïve. Of course powerful organizations are going to leverage forums as another form of marketing and PR. People still regard online forums as places where organic discussion occurs and are not a bought-out shit shows like other media platforms. That's a very valuable perception to exploit. It's safe to assume most orgs are going to do this with discussion forums related to their sectors. Hiring a few tools to pose as real fans to direct sentiment in a way that benefits them is such a low-cost and high value prospect. Look up the "poltergeist initiative" by the NSA, it's a playbook for doing this very thing.