The UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) has a big weekend ahead of them as the heavyweight championship of the world is on the line. Although this alone is exciting enough for me it might not be as interesting to you so I decided to take a look at their marketing plan for this fight card. In the championship fight, the UFC’s biggest star and WWF machine turned UFC fighter Brock Lesnar is set to face off against a man who is at not even close to the same level of popularity Cain Velasquez. Since Brock Lesnar entered the UFC, the Pay-per-view numbers have never been higher, so one might think that on a business level, the UFC is really hoping that Brock Lesner wins and remains the Heavyweight Champion of the world, right? Well take a look at the official promo for the fight and think about what the UFC might be doing.
There has been a lot of discussion on why the UFC would play the race card like this in promoting the fight but in my mind this is a brilliant strategy. It’s clear that they have identified a huge opportunity in the potential Mexican Segment and want to try their best to enter this market.
The Large Mexican market is currently primarily a boxing market and one that hasn’t been tapped into by the UFC. Recently efforts have been made to enter into this market (offering PPV broadcasts in 100% spanish) but the UFC has never tried to market a Mexican fighter like this. To me this is a fantastic strategy because even if Brock Lesnar, the biggest Star in the Promotion, was to lose, the UFC would still come out happy as this would spark Mexican interest immensely. The part about this that I find interesting is the fact that Cain Velasquez is not even born in Mexico. The UFC doesn’t care about this however, he has a clear Mexican heritage and this marketing scheme has basically turned the fight on Saturday into a win-win situation for the company, no matter what the result.
Anyways those are my thoughts, it’s interesting to take a step back from watching a sport like this that I like so much to see all the marketing factors and strategies that go into each fight card, which normally I might not have noticed.