Did WME fire most of their marketing/advertising team in order to cut costs?

[Houdini]

Tough transition period. Contemplating which direction to go, do they go the professional sporting route or spectacle entertainment route. MLB, NBA, NFL, etc. have no problem building stars because they let performance of athletes speak for themselves show a highlight video that type of shit. Those sports get legit sponsors not tied down to Rebok. Where as entertainment is people pretending to be something else, seems like a lot of fighters don’t want to go that route but what more can you expect from a company owned by actors and entertainers. They just don’t know what they have yet.

 

[ixRanGzeNxi]

It is 90% the fault of the UFC that he is not fighting and has not fought in this length of time. He was under contract and they allowed him to go box and make a ridiculous amount of money. That never should’ve happened. The fact that they have had a hard time getting him back, is basically entirely their fault. They fucked up with their biggest star. You don’t do that.

I agree that what happened with Conor is mainly the fault of the UFC, but my issue at this moment is his fans defending his inaction.

 

[Mike]

The ufc has ALWAYS sucked at promotion. Really, really bad at it. But yes, it's somehow even worse under WME. It's actually amazing how bad they are at it.

I'm a hardcore fan and still forget about certain fight night cards. No promotion in the mainstream media whatsoever.

 

[ixRanGzeNxi]

I understood what you said perfectly. And I'm telling you this is how real life works. Never has been and never will. When you're rich and famous you play by a different set of rules. Always has been.

Yeah, sure they can feel like they can do whatever and, at times, do whatever. My issue is when fans start defending them for their shit actions. When even the fans defend someone like Conor when he is actively avoiding fights and has already held up not one but TWO divisions, other fighters will see it as okay and start to do the same. Why should a fighter fight when he is rich and his fans' love him even when he doesn't fight for extended periods of time? When the said fighter doesn't even have to explain himself because his delusional fans provide all sorts of excuses for him?

I would love it if Conor came back and fought more elite fighters, but he refuses to and his fans defend his refusal. It's mind-blowing for me to see such shit.

PS: I am no fan of Conor, but he is legitimately one of the best strikers in MMA. I want him to either come back and prove his and his fans claims of him being so great (GOAT), or come back and lose to prove the nay-sayers right.

 

[ImNotSurpisedDonks!]

we got spoiled during that conor and that other guy ( aldo) world tour lol...

That shit was amazing. Never will we see anything like that again. It was all setting up the Epic Fertitta Con tho, and was the perfect combo of invincible seeming Aldo and cocky, lyrical and charismatic Conor - two totally different personalities set on an imminent collision course. Just looking back on it, we got too spoiled: hundreds of threads a day just on who said what and who was in who's head, like a Game Of Thrones MMA hype battle.

 

[Eme]

A penny saved is a penny earned.

Also you have to spend money to make money.

 

[J0N0]

They promote nowhere near as much as the Fertittas did, especially for their “big” cards (UFC 226).

85K PPV buys is the result.

What methods of promotion do you mean specifically when you say that they don't promote as much as they used to?

 

[anuscakes]

UFC 226 is a week away and all they've done promotion wise is about 6 mins of youtube videos. I expect this card to do about 350k buys.