UFC vs. WWE: 10 Things Dana White Could Learn from Vince McMahon

Whether UFC President Dana White wants to admit it or not, he and WWE Chairman Vince McMahon compete for a lot of the same audience with their UFC and WWE products. And there is actually quite a bit that White could learn from McMahon.

Now MMA fans, don’t get too irritated before you even begin to read. I’m not trying to say that they are the same thing. Of course they aren’t. The UFC is legitimate competition between two highly trained athletes, while the WWE is simulated competition between two, also highly trained athletes.

But the similarity is that while one comes right out and says it and the other doesn’t, they are both forms of entertainment, generally for a male audience between the ages of 18-35.

For the past few decades, one company has been the king of this demographic. Sure, there may be other sports which have a wider fanbase, but no company has caught the attention of and latched onto this important demographic quite like the WWE has.

Though we recently found out that, according to McMahon, the WWE and UFC are not working together to purchase a television network; there is still a lot that the UFC President could learn from his WWE counterpart. 

10.Elaborate Entrances

Do you remember the "fun" days of the UFC? Back when Tito Ortiz used to walk to the cage with "Break Stuff" by Limp Bizkit blaring in the background while fireworks lit up the building?

What happened?

Maybe someone higher-up decided that it was time to get rid of the theatrics in an attempt to dismiss the stigma that the UFC was nothing but human cockfighting. Maybe they wanted to present it as the true sport that it is. I get it. It was probably a business decision.

But isn't it time to have fun again?

The talent would love it and the fans would love it. It just makes sense

9.Controversy Creates Cash

The pro wrestling world learned this one decades ago with the whole Andy Kaufman vs. Jerry Lawler feud in Memphis. Unfortunately, MMA organizations have had to fend off the legal battles surrounding their sport while simultaneously contain any potential bad press.

Doing this has done wonders for the advancement of the sport, but it neglects the point that fans ultimately love to see the gritty, behind-the-scenes controversy.

The WWE has the benefit of being able to fake their controversy, but that doesn't mean that the UFC can't learn from them. Take the Michael Bisping spitting incident from UFC 127 for example. Aside from internet stories about the situation, the UFC largely downplayed the whole story.

But a wiser financial decision may have been to play up the incident and try to use it almost in an effort to turn Bisping into a "bad guy" who fans can tune in to cheer against.

Maybe Dana doesn't want to turn his biggest overseas cash cow into that, but there is little doubt that doing so could be financially beneficial for the company in the long-run.

8.Stick to What You’re Good at

Fans of the WWE have seen the company’s chairman get himself involved with numerous different, mostly failed, projects.

Whether it’s the shortly-lived minor league hockey team McMahon owned in the early 80’s, the World Bodybuilding Federation in the early 90’s or the colossal flop that was the XFL in the early 2000’s; those who have followed McMahon’s non-wrestling businesses know how unsuccessful they have been.

There is one thing that McMahon does better than anyone, and that thing is pro wrestling. There’s not even a debate about it. He has the most successful, widest-reaching product ever created and even in its low points, he has always found a way to keep the company generating revenue.

As Zuffa grows, it is certain to find itself with opportunities to venture into other areas. Sure, they may be smarter overall businesspeople than McMahon, but why mess with a good thing? If they stick to the fighting world, they are sure to continue developing the kind of dominant monopoly in MMA that McMahon has created in the pro wrestling world.

7.Fan Interaction

Some sports teams do a better job than others of getting their players to interact with their fans, but as a league, no league has done it better—for longer—than the WWE.

Of course, it’s much easier when your “sport” is a form of entertainment versus legitimate competition, but the WWE has always played to its fanbase, both inside the ring and out.

CM Punk recently brought this to light with a storyline where he used his internet stardom to essentially play the fans against one another in his feud with John Cena and the WWE as a whole. It’s a story, but it just helps the fans feel more involved.

Certainly the UFC can’t do that, but they can continue to promote their fighters’ interactivity with fans, as they have done with their Twitter campaign.

One thing that the UFC did seem to pull from the WWE was their “Fight for the Troops” cards which nearly directly mirrored the WWE’s concept, “Tribute to the Troops” which they have been doing for quite awhile now. This idea has helped bring smiles to the faces of America’s toughest workers and really promotes the organizations as being thoughtful contributors to the country’s entertainment. 

6.Competition Can Be a Good Thing

Sometimes you have to learn from mistakes, and I think it’s safe to say that the WWE has had to learn from many mistakes over their days. Perhaps none greater than their acquisition of their largest, longest-lasting major competitor, World Championship Wrestling.

It’s not that the WWE didn’t “win” by buying WCW. It did.

But it also marked the last time that WWE was legitimately pushed by a competitor to put out a better product to its fans. It also meant that the stars they used to be able to acquire from that competitor were no longer being created.

How many wrestlers from TNA have come to the WWE and been superstars? Practically none. And how many WCW stars came to WWF and became huge stars? Countless.

The bottom line is that, although it can be difficult to admit sometimes, competition pushes businesses to be better.

The UFC has seen its share of competitors from Pride to Strikeforce, both of which they now own. No new promotion has shown itself as being the next major competitor to the Zuffa empire and it may be awhile before anyone does. This is great for the UFC’s bottom line at the moment, but down the road, it could end up being something that keeps them from re-inventing their business to cater to the always changing market.

5.Women Are Athletes, Too

UFC President Dana White has been quoted countless times as saying that he essentially does not care one bit about women’s mixed martial arts and doesn’t believe that it is something that can be a money-maker.

Strikeforce began testing that theory when they first promoted Gina Carano vs. Cristiane “Cyborg” Santos as the first women’s main event of a major MMA promotion back in August 2009 when their title fight main evented a card named “Strikeforce: Carano vs. Cyborg.” The event was successful, but it was also the last time that the world’s biggest female MMA star, Carano, has fought.

That alone has been enough to keep women’s MMA from growing even with the success of Cyborg and new champion Miesha Tate.

But while things seem to be slowly dying in women’s MMA, the WWE has been a promoter of women’s wrestling for decades. Even their most dainty, attractive-looking female workers have stepped into the ring and many have even become champion. The female division has never been much more than a sideshow, but it has been something that helps to break up the men’s action.

No one is trying to say that Dana White should continue promoting a women’s MMA fight as a main event like Strikeforce did before its Zuffa purchase, but would it kill him to at least let there be an occasional women’s fight on the card?

4.Accept That Personality Clashes Happen

Sometimes people just don’t get along.

We have seen that for years with Dana White and former UFC light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz. Ortiz and White actually used to be very close, with White being Ortiz’s manager for years, but they eventually grew apart when White became more of a voice with the UFC product.

Their bitterness toward one another has been an awkward source of entertainment, but Ortiz has been able to keep his job despite the feud. Unfortunately, other fighters haven’t had the same luck.

Guys like Josh Barnett, Frank Shamrock and Paul Daley have been kicked out and kept out of the promotion after individual incidents or a series of incidences... And Dana White has been the biggest voice that has kept them out of the organization.

Vince McMahon and the WWE have also dealt with their fair share of personalities. Guys like Hulk Hogan and Bret Hart were among the biggest stars in the sport’s history, but had falling outs with Vince McMahon. Still, later, they were able to come back together in order to make money together.

Dana White has one of the strongest personalities in all of sports, but he may benefit from just a little bit more understanding when it comes to his talent if it means a big time fight happening.

3.Keep the Fans Wanting More

One thing that WWE has always done a great job of is keeping the fans wanting more by promoting their future main events. This has been done, historically, by setting up storylines to keep fans interested in or spark new a new feud in the main event scene.

Obviously the UFC doesn’t have the benefit of being able to create matches from thin air by picking and choosing the winners of fights, but the concept of story building can still exist in real sports.

The easiest way to do this is to truly promote “number one contendership” fights. Lately, the UFC has had too many vague contendership fights that may or may not mean much of anything in the grand scheme of things. This is particularly important in divisions with cloudy title pictures such as the light heavyweight and lightweight divisions.

With all the talent floating around in those divisions, it’s hard to tell who really is next in line. Sure, we now know that Rashad Evans is the number one contender after he defeated Tito Ortiz, but what would have happened if Tito Ortiz won that fight? Talk about throwing a wrench into the plans.

By just announcing Ortiz vs. Evans as an official No. 1 contendership fight, there is instantly added intrigue. Even if Ortiz wins the fight unconvincingly and shouldn’t realistically be given the next title shot, the fans would be interested in seeing him get the next shot because he won the opportunity by defeating the existing No. 1 contender while taking the fight on short notice.

Giving the fans something to look forward to and a storyline to follow with fights, particularly main events, is a great way to guarantee pay-per-view buys right now and in the future. 

2.24/7 Content

One of the coolest things that WWE has done in recent years is their WWE 24/7 channel, now known as Classics On Demand.

This service allows the hardcore fan the relive some of the most memorable moments in their childhood as well as their adult lives as fans of the WWE. The concept seems simple, but it also makes a lot of sense. People love nostalgia, and that’s all that this whole thing is.

The UFC doesn’t have the same type of rich history that the WWE does with weekly television programming for the past few decades in a row, but it does still have plenty of excellent content. Not only do they have their own video library, but they now also own Pride and Strikeforce’s video libraries.

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to pay a monthly fee to have access to practically any UFC fight in history? Not only would it be cool to relive some of the early days of the sport, but it might even be useful for some of the fighters themselves as they look back at previous fights which featured their upcoming opponent.

1.WrestleMania

Whether wrestling is in a boom or a recession, one event has never struggled—WrestleMania.

There’s just something different about WrestleMania. The competitors are the same, but the atmosphere is just so much different. No matter the year, every worker just seems to rise to the occasion when they are in the big spotlight at the “Grandaddy of them all.”

The UFC has never had anything like this, and there really doesn’t seem to be a logical reason as to why. It’s not like they get roughly the same amount of buys for every pay-per-view regardless of the competitors. In fact, their buys vary drastically, much more than the WWE’s do, depending on who is fighting on the card.

If the UFC put on a huge pay-per-view event like WrestleMania, they could double or even triple their profits by increasing pay-per-view sales while also raising the price of the event both for tickets as well as on television.

Sure, paying numerous top stars to be on the same card would be expensive, but the amount of media coverage would be astronomical and would only serve to help grow the sport at an even quicker pace than before.

In fact, they came close to doing this for UFC 129: St-Pierre vs. Shields when they promoted one of the most stacked cards in the organization’s history. The pay-per-view numbers went through the roof, the fanfare was insane and the success of the event was monumental.

If they added just one more big fight, they could have easily promoted it as the biggest fight card in the promotion’s history. Then everyone would have been on board with buying it. They could have even sold it for double the cost of a normal “numbered” UFC event.

Making money is the name of the game for the UFC and a huge event like WWE’s WrestleMania would do wonders for the organization.