UFC: Undisputedly Fantastic Content

The UFC is not a fight company, it’s a production company—

one of the biggest in the world—that just happens to sell fights.

This is a quote from Into the Cage: The Rise of UFC Nation by Nick Gullo. As a mixed martial arts (MMA) fan who not only watches MMA fights but also follows matchmaking, fight preparation, fight promotion, weigh-ins, and post-fight press conferences, most of which is available on YouTube, this made complete sense to me. I’ve always been impressed with not just the depth of insider coverage of the UFC (which stands for “Ultimate Fighting Championship”), but also the quality of video production. A sampling of UFC programs that I regularly watch include (in no particular order):

• UFC Countdown: summarizes the journey of the fighters leading up to UFC events
• UFC Inside the Octagon: analysts profile fighter strengths, weaknesses, and fight strategy
• UFC Embedded: an inside view of the lives of fighters in the days leading up to an event
• UFC Connected: a detailed focus on UFC fighters and their lives in and out of the octagon
• Dana White: Lookin’ for a Fight: Dana and his buddies watch local fight promotions; show production is in an adrenaline-pumping, profanity-laced travel vlog format
• Dana White’s Contender Series: a fight card in between UFC events, with certain fighters on each episode awarded UFC contracts

There are also special video series such as UFC: 25 Years in Short. And let’s not forget The Ultimate Fighter reality TV series whose season 1 finale arguably saved the UFC from bankruptcy. Since I make home movies and have my own YouTube channel, I can appreciate the professional production quality of all UFC videos. The UFC really does invest a lot of effort in keeping its fan base engaged in its business 365 days a year, and a big part of that, at least from my experience, is through high quality video content. Recently I came across an article that provides insight into the UFC’s finances, and it provided the following chart:

Content production costs totaled a whopping 19.6% of all UFC expenses in 2015. The only larger expense category was fighter compensation (23.0%), and coming in third was employee compensation (11.3%). In other words, the UFC spends almost twice as much money producing content as it does paying its own employees. Note that there is a separate category for marketing costs (10.4%), exclusive of content production.

Elsewhere in the book, Nick Gullo summarizes a conversation with UFC President Dana White. Dana asserts that boxing promoters don’t invest in the sport because they simply coordinate and promote boxing matches, then take their money and run. Gullo writes:

On the flip side, the UFC “four walls” the event—which means they handle everything: broadcast production, ticket and merchandise sales, designing posters, you name it. The organization 24/7 promotes its fighters, pushes them in the UFC magazine and The Ultimate Fighter, features them on the UFC website, the television shows, video blogs, billboards. Drive down the highway, enter a grocery store, flip on the TV, wherever you turn it’s UFC Nation. And because they do everything and control everything, they deliver product that eclipses boxing.

I appreciate when my world view is challenged by a new perspective, and I agree that the UFC is a production company that happens to sell fights. I think this also supports Bill Gates’ assertion that content is king. While there are other MMA promotions such as Bellator, ONE Championship, Professional Fighters League, Titan Fighting Championships, Rizin Fighting Federation, and many others, the UFC is in a class of its own by any measure. I believe that its content production and its “four walls” approach has a lot to do with its success.

Even if you are not a fan of MMA, hopefully you’ll at least click on some of the links and appreciate the high quality UFC video content.