Perhaps no fan base in all of sport or entertainment is more vocal than WWE’s. Whether it trough hand-crafted posters, spirited tweets, or the traditional cheers and boos, WWE fans are always making their opinions heard. But does it matter?
At Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit, Stephanie McMahon addressed how much attention WWE pays to its fan base when it comes to planning the company’s direction.
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“Our audience tells us what they love, what they don’t like and worse, what they don’t care about. And you have to be listening, and in WWE, yes, we do, we pivot on the fly,” McMahon said.
Stephanie would go on to elaborate how WWE plots their creative checkpoints and the fanbases’ role in their strategy.
“It’s an advantage that we’re live. We do set our storylines out a year in advance, WrestleMania being our Super Bowl and then we program backward, but things happen. The audience might not be invested in a character that we think they will be invested in for whatever reason. There could be an injury that happens, because we really are an incredible athletic event as well. Anything can happen, so that ability to pivot and twist is really important,” she said.
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Even more, McMahon asserts that this process of gauging fans’ interest is just as essential for NXT and potential call-ups.
“And when you think about NXT, for example, our audience is actually determining who makes it to the next level, who goes to that main roster,” McMahon said. “And they know it, they know that they are a part of that person’s success, so they are that much more invested in it. And again, I just think that engagement is really important,” she said.
As much as it seems WWE ignores it fans and simply does at it pleases, they will bend on occasion to appease their base. The best example of this is Daniel Bryan‘s YES Movement that peaked at WrestleMania 30. However, the counter-argument to this is WWE’s stubbornness to alter Roman Reigns‘ heavy push. Having been routinely rejected by fans, Vince McMahon and Co. have continued to double-down on the Big Dog. In their defense, they look to be right, even if by accident, as Roman Reigns is unconditionally one of the biggest stars in WWE.
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There’s a big difference between listening to the fans and taking action on their request. Yet, as Steph mentioned, it still is (and always will be) the fans who to make a WWE Superstar a Champion.
Stephanie pointed out that it’s apathy that kills wrestlers, and as far as someone like Roman Reigns goes, “apathetic” is simply not a way to describe how the WWE Universe feel about him. So if you want to create a change, don’t boo or cheer, because those are the noises WWE makes money off of.
