Marketing Case: UFC's Evolution from an underground company into a corporate giant
- The Ultimate Fighting Championship was founded in November 1993 by Rorion Gracie, Art Davie, John Milius, Campbell Mclaren, and Bob Meyrowitz. The company/league was created to see which martial arts discipline was the most dominant. Fighters from different disciplines were recruited and put against one another inside of a octagon shaped steel cage. Their first event UFC 1, used an 8 man elimination tournament formant, with the winner receiving $50,000.
- Throughout the 90's and early 2000's, the company faced major controversies and backlash from the general public and some politicians. The sport was seen as barbarical and unethical by the masses. With politicians like John McCain claiming the UFC was a form of "human cockfighting." Mccain forced the company to comply to regulations. To counter the naysayers and the controversy, the UFC established a new way of doing things: addition of weight classes, complying with sanctioned athletic commissions, and addition of rules.
- In 2001 UFC was bought by Zuffa LLC, and appointed Dana White as its president. White is credited with transforming the relatively small company into a prolific corporation, basically, he catapulted the company into the mainstream. White is known to be an avid twitter user, going as far as calling twitter "the greatest marketing tool in the world." He loves it because he can directly engage with fans and promote events leading up to their start, etc.
- Milestones include: 2014 Rebook Deal, Deal with Fox in 2011, 2016 UFC was sold for $4 billion, held their first event at Madison Square Garden in 2016, and in 2017 they had a huge cross promotion super fight: the face of UFC Conor McGregor vs Boxing's Floyd Mayweather.
- Revenue: UFC is a private company, therefore they can't disclose much information to the general public, but in an interview Dana White stated that in 2015, the company made around $600 million in revenues.
- Value Proposition: They provide a new form of sports entertainment that can't be found in other pro sports leagues. And they are gender inclusive, meaning that females and males compete in the same league, same pay per view events, and sometimes they even get to headline the event. Females compete with other females, and males compete with other males, no battle of the sexes or anything like that. Another thing to add to the proposition is that UFC is fun and wild, who doesn't like seeing action? Last but not least, the UFC is the number one fight league in the world, they provide the best match ups and fights as well as the best quality in regards to promoting and delivering quality to its fans.
- I would not change anything about the company, why? Because Dana White got turned down by investors and other sources of funds when he was trying to build the company. Somehow through hard work and perseverance, he catapulted the underdog company into the corporation gian it is now, and it's still growing as there's still a lot of space and available mediums to deliver its product/service offerings.
Sources:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuRCRCgh5pE
a o
