The UFC: Black Belts in Social Media Marketing
According to UFC President, Dana White "Twitter is the Greatest Marketing Tool in the History of the World."
Dana Whites Social Media presence is most prominent on Twitter where the outspoken head honcho at the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) regularly posts the latest fight announcements, UFC events, and fan contests. White is also known for his regular fan interaction on Twitter, and it’s common to see him engaged in heated conversations with Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fans. Often responding to negative messages from folks with his own not so sweet tweets (for example he called a fan an idiot the other day) White does what most company execs would avoid. But, it is in part his brashness and willingness to interact with fans that makes Dana White so popular among fans and such a force in social media.
The UFC’s Twitter involvement doesn’t end with their Pres., the UFC promotes several Twitter accounts and more importantly encourages all its fighters to have a Twitter account so that they both can market themselves and engage with fans. The current UFC roster contains over 300 fighters, so the idea is brilliant in that fans get to interact with their favorite fighters and the UFC of course can expand its social media marketing efforts even wider using its employees (something all companies should consider doing).
But the marketing guru’s social media presence doesn’t stop there; perhaps even more prominent is the UFC’s Facebook page. With over 7 million “likes” the page is one of the most visited pages on Facebook, and a gigantic part of that is what the UFC offers to fans of the page. While many fans post photos of themselves with their favorite fighters featured in upcoming fight cards, what really brings in the likes is the innovative idea of free Preliminary Fights aired live for fans of the page. If you are not familiar with the UFC, prelim fights are not aired live on their Pay-Per-View, but as all MMA fans know these fights are often exciting with lesser known fighters giving it their all in hopes of breaking to thru to the main fight card.
Dana White also regularly posts a popular video blog on YouTube that gives fans a fascinating behind the scenes look at the UFC and its outspoken Pres. The video blog follows White in the days leading up to a fight at press conferences, weigh-ins, cage side and even backstage allowing fans to get an up close look at what happens before and after the fights. Additionally, the UFC utilizes YouTube to promote upcoming events and by posting fight previews and fighter interviews.
The UFC’s massive success promoting and constantly engaging fans via social media speaks to its overall non-stop barrage of marketing efforts which has helped expand the organization worldwide with an event held in Brazil earlier this month, and with upcoming fights in Japan, Australia and Sweden this year. Even more impressive the UFC recently landed a groundbreaking deal with FOX further positioning MMA as the fastest growing sport in the world.
As a gigantic fan of MMA and as an online marketing geek I found the UFC as a great example of effective social media marketing that other companies could learn a few techniques from.
Till the next Big Fight!
Kaled