Song of the Week: Knocked Loose – “Deep in the Willow”
Word of the week: Marketing | Marketing
So I have to talk about last night.
Even as a very loyal AEW fan, I'm not going to sugarcoat this. All Elite Wrestling looks like he'll be back in 2024, but there's still one drawback to him.
Ticket sales are low.
Look, I don't want to be a naysayer, especially as an avid AEW supporter. Weekly attendance is not everything. In the early '90s, WCW Saturday Night's audience rarely exceeded his 1,000, and he still airs on TBS, with pay-per-view attendances ranging from his 5,000 to his 9,000.
Can AEW continue to thrive with low gate counts and solid TV deals? Of course you can. To date, “Revolution” has sold over 15,000 copies and “All In 2024” has sold over 35,000, so AEW's bigger shows aren't lacking in crowds.
Remember that both WWE and AEW derive most of their income from media rights. This number outstrips revenue from live events by a nearly 10:1 ratio.
But it looks much better optically if there are a little more people, right? The audience for Dynamite last night was pretty small. And this is no offense to the people of Savannah. I've been to Savannah. It's a wonderful city. But the final number of tickets totaled about 2,100 for the 8,000-plus seat arena (versus 3,700 last year).
And you can see it on TV. Last night's show was very quiet.
And it's not that the show was bad. Subjectively, we still had a good show.But if it sounds like less than 1,000 participants, the value of your product is diminished. No matter how good a live show is, wrestling fans are the ones who determine the success or failure of a live show. They are as much a part of it as the talent themselves.
So far this year, average attendance for AEW's weekly shows has hovered in the 3,000 range. Again, not bad, especially when compared to his now popular WWE product. But in reality you want a range of at least 4,000 or more. This is a reasonable number for a professional wrestling organization that has been in existence for five years and is the second largest.
So can we do better? As someone who has worked in marketing in the past, yes.
Here's how:
“But it’s a hard cam!”
I'm not some weirdo who obsess over hard cam shots. It has been common practice for decades to fill the other side of the hard cam first and then release more tickets as needed. There have been a lot of times in WWE's past shows where we've seen the hard cam aspect that seems empty.
However, if you take a risk and play in a smaller market like Savannah, you might get what you got last night in a small crowd. And let's be honest, Savannah may not have a very big crowd for pro wrestling in general (WWE has had similar problems in the past with Savannah crowds dying).
However, in comparison, AEW's Phoenix show in two weeks has already sold more than 3,000 tickets. It's realistic that this show will reach 5,000 viewers by the time it airs. And look, comparing AEW to the number one pro wrestling company during WrestleMania season is stupid. AEW doesn't sell 80,000 to 10,000 tickets per show every week. But 5000 yen is reasonable, right?
Stay away from small markets.
-Collision from Bossier City, Los Angeles currently has 1,115 tickets on sale at the time of writing.
-The February 10 crash in Henderson, Nevada resulted in fewer than 1,000 units sold.
-New Orleans Dynamite (bigger market) We will sell about 1,500 pieces next week.
And the last one: WWE Raw literally just had a match in New Orleans three days ago. Why would he book a week later when Raw just arrived in this area? Pro wrestling fans only have so much money to spend on shows…
I'll say it again.
Stay away from small markets. Do not play the area for one week after the competition ends. common sense.
Moving on…
I've heard many examples of markets with little to no advertising for AEW shows. This is very common, especially in less populated markets.Researching for Savannah's show also led me to exactly that One News articles about it.News article about the feud between Adam Copeland and Christian Cage did it Even further away.
did it?
Not only did it not happen, but could it happen?
This is unacceptable. Tell people what they're getting.
I helped market a community theater and put more cigarette butts in the seats than Wednesday's show. that's community theater — Not a mainstream wrestling promotion. Save the money to sign a few more wrestlers and put it into your marketing budget.
Every Dynamite and Collision must include (at a minimum) multiple radio spots, local TV commercials, billboards, social media campaigns, news interviews, press releases, and swag giveaways with local businesses. a few weeks later From the show itself.
If AEW is coming to your city, it has to be uncomfortably obvious.
And to take this idea even further, let's expand into surrounding areas.
people have cars. i have one. I've been to Dynamite three times so far, and each time I drove 2-3 hours. Fans would travel if they knew the show was going to happen in the first place. However, I have never seen a Dynamite promotion in my area and I live only two hours away from a city where AEW has had many matches.
We need to improve this significantly. If AEW were to come to my area, whole state You should know.
And as for the show itself…
This is a simple exercise. Use Dynamite stories to build and announce next week's matches. This not only improves the storytelling, but also keeps fans entertained.
Oddly enough, this week was one of the best examples of that. Give your fans some fun. I'm looking forward to two matches next week: Deonna Purrazzo vs. Taya Valkyrie and Dealer's Choice between Adam Page and Swerve Strickland.
This is good, but it could be better. Have you heard from Samoa Joe? Adam Copeland? What feud will deepen next week? Whatever happens next week needs to be hyped.
AEW has a bit of good momentum, but the announcement of a random match between Dynamite and Collision won't work for the rest of the year. Some stories need to start being told, and that means building towards the matches taking place next week as well as furthering the feud mentioned above.
I'll be frank here. I am grateful to TK and everything he has done for AEW. He's a really great guy and I think he just wants the best for AEW…
…But if he can't book multiple weeks of Dynamite or Collision at a time per match, we're in serious trouble. That's Booking 101. I had practiced it with her when she was a teenager, when I was booking e-feeds.
Luckily, three matches have already been announced for next week's Dynamite from New Orleans. And we need another one featuring local favorite Ricky Starks. This needs to become the norm.
Sting/Darby vs. Starks/Big Bill has been announced for February 7th in Phoenix and can be built over the next two weeks. This needs to become the norm.
If people knew what to expect, they would probably attend.
Equally important is at least announcing who will appear in person.
If Swerve Strickland announces he's going to appear on Dynamite “live,” he'd better either A) have a match or B) do some in-ring promo. If it was neither, or just a backstage promotion, then he didn't actually appear “live.”
Again, we're building consistency. This is marketing 101. It gives your audience a set of expectations that they can bank on. When I went to the show last year, I had no idea who was going to be there or not until I watched a match or two.
That's not a good thing. It's like going to a music festival where only a few bands are presented.
Make this a habit by covering the entire lineup of next week's shows and featuring them on local ads and billboards. However, take a look at some of the lineup for the coming weeks via aewtix.com in the image above.
We know that Kenny Omega is injured. Why feature him in Phoenix in two weeks? Julia Hart appeared on Savannah's poster this week. spoiler: She never had a match on Dynamite or Rampage. So did Jericho, who was also featured on the poster.
And you better meet Willow Nightingale and Julia Hart at Collison on February 3rd. It's advertised, right?
I work in media for a living. I always use Premiere Pro and Photoshop. It's not difficult to update your show's graphics and replace old ones online.
Come on everyone. I'm sure you can do more than this…
If fans can guess who will be attending along with the announced live cast, even more fans will want to attend.
The only thing missing in AEW is a hero. Wrestling promotions, sports-based or otherwise, always need top babyfaces fighting evil. The main storyline invested in one hero is the backbone of every major pro wrestling promotion in history.
Whether it's Hogan, Sting, Flair, or in this case Rose, storytelling is all about making the main character as visible as possible.
Unfortunately, AEW doesn't have this at the moment.
A sports-based approach can also accomplish this. You can also accomplish this using a ranking system.
So what Khan needs to do is get back to being the original protagonist of AEW. “Hangman” Adam Page.
He is loved by most of the fans, is great in the ring, is solid on the mic, and seems to be keeping himself in shape. Magnum TA era at the moment. And while it's nice to have an on-and-off feud with Swerve Strickland, it's not a very good dynamic.
Swerve and Page both need to go up at the same time, but down different paths. After this current storyline, both need to have a big feud, but against two different heels. Personally, I don't know why, but “Hangman” vs. House of Black Feud It hasn't happened yet. Even if it pairs Page with two random proven faces to protect the House, Page vs. Black is a PPV headliner in its own right, with a good vs. evil story built into it.
and again, Swerve Strickland vs. Ricky Starks This is another feud that I will never understand. Why hasn't it happened yet?
But I don't care if it's Page, Swerve, Cassidy, Hook, or hell, turning Griff Garrison into a top babyface. Simply select your main character and feature it as your main character in all your Dynamite promotions.
Give fans something consistent to look forward to when attending these shows live.
Do better.
You can leave it as is, right? But let's be honest. It seems like more effort went into assembling the best roster in the industry than letting consumers know it existed in the first place.
All of AEW's talent needs to look like a million bucks. Every show needs to be promoted as a “must-see,” and fans need to satisfy their desire to see more in every city AEW plays. It's not that AEW doesn't do a good job of marketing their product, but it's kind of average.
You're the #2 wrestling company, you don't have a TV deal yet, and you have the #1 popular WWE product breathing down your neck. Now is not the time to relax and run your business as usual. And yes, I know Khan recently hired former WWE Live Events Regional Director Kosha Irby as his COO. I would like to give him time here without any doubt. However, marketing is not a step-by-step process.
Either you do it or you don't.
AEW needs a marketing team, not a marketer. The next time AEW comes to my area, I'll be so overwhelmed by the promotion that I'll be anxious for weeks before attending.
Let's do better. AEW fans deserve it.
-TKW
tokusenwrestling@yahoo.com
(Social media sucks. Email me)
