Heyman demoted as head writer of Smackdown

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

There is an overstated value on the 'casual fan'. Proper Business rules state that it is best to appeal to the loyal, hardcore, base consumer than reaching out for new ones. Which is why the WWE is in the condition they are in right now. In putting up the ceiling they smashed up the floors... the house is about to cave in.

[Guest EN090]

Valid point on both sides.

 

Agreed

[Guest EN090]

There is an overstated value on the 'casual fan'. Proper Business rules state that it is best to appeal to the loyal, hardcore, base consumer than reaching out for new ones. Which is why the WWE is in the condition they are in right now. In putting up the ceiling they smashed up the floors... the house is about to cave in.

 

I disagree with that. The WWE cannot simply afford to cater to their hardcore fan because he will most likely be around anyway and that the fanbase is just too small for them to make a lot of money from. Look at two of the most successful eras in the history of WWE/WWF - The Hulkamania era of the 80's and the Attitude era of the late 90's. Both periods brought in tons of cash to Titan. Those two eras were all about bringing the casual viewers in. In the case of Attitude, it saved the WWF because they were going out of business and fast.

 

How did the the success of the Attitude era come to be? Through quality storylines that hooked the casual viewer. I firmly believe that if the quality of the storylines had not gone down the toilet from the period of late 2000 to now, the WWE would be in the hole that they are.

[Guest Brian]

No, I think RRR brings up a good point. The WWE's problem is that it doesn't do a good enough job catering to it's loyal fanbase. When things are odwn like they are, who does the WWE have to fall back on? Eventually, at some point this base is not going to be there for them if they continue to get screwed over. These are the people that are going to communicate to the casual fans. Especially now that they don't have a second product to hold their interests. Without a loyal base, how do you weather out the problems. And genrally everytime you're going to go through a boom, you're going to attract a large number of fans and some of them are going to stay around, so you're better off converting them and understanding how to give them what they want rather than just waiting around for the next big thing to come around while not building around the fan base you have.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

Dude, this is in my freakin marketing textbook!

 

 

“Long-term customer satisfaction leads to the retention of customers and generates substantial profits. It is more profitable for firms to keep customers than to be constantly seeking new ones. Developing satisfied customers is therefore an important way to meet the organization’s performance objectives.” (Sommers/Barnes: Fundamentals of marketing, 9th Canadian Edition)

[Guest EN090]

No, I think RRR brings up a good point.

 

Fine, then I take my smiley face back!

 

The WWE's problem is that it doesn't do a good enough job catering to it's loyal fanbase. When things are odwn like they are, who does the WWE have to fall back on? Eventually, at some point this base is not going to be there for them if they continue to get screwed over. These are the people that are going to communicate to the casual fans. Especially now that they don't have a second product to hold their interests. Without a loyal base, how do you weather out the problems. And genrally everytime you're going to go through a boom, you're going to attract a large number of fans and some of them are going to stay around, so you're better off converting them and understanding how to give them what they want rather than just waiting around for the next big thing to come around while not building around the fan base you have.

 

But the point is that business wouldn't be down if the WWE quit screwing around, playing political games, and focused on writing quality storylines and booking good matches. The loyal fanbase has been around for the past 30 years and they won't go anywhere. And besides, I think they're getting exactly what they want on Smackdown with quality wrestling every week.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

They won't go anywhere? You sure about that?

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

<--- Didn't want Al Wilson, Rikishi vs. Rookies, Dawn Marie or Torrie Wilson, Cruiserweights 'enhancing' hosses, cena rapping, nathan jones...

[Guest EN090]

Dude, this is in my freakin marketing textbook!

 

“Long-term customer satisfaction leads to the retention of customers and generates substantial profits. It is more profitable for firms to keep customers than to be constantly seeking new ones. Developing satisfied customers is therefore an important way to meet the organization’s performance objectives.” (Sommers/Barnes: Fundamentals of marketing, 9th Canadian Edition)

 

Dude... these "customers" have been around for the past thirty years and aren't go anywhere. They've already been established.

 

And yes, RRR, I'm sure. They've sat through Doink the Clown, TL Hopper, The Goon, Te Gobbelty Gooker, and they haven't gone anywhere. They're not leaving.

[Guest Brian]

No they haven't. Read Meltzer's analysis on the loss of the older audience. They don't stick around.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

Oh, so you just think that RAWs ratings and attendance getting cut in half is just all casual fans?

[Guest EN090]

Maybe not all but most. A lot of my friends, casual viewers, used to watch wrestling but say that it's boring now.

[Guest Super Pissed Smark]

I have a hard time believing that people watching thirty years ago, back in, um, 1973 , are still watching now. The product seems so radically different. And Vince hasn't just lost half his audience, he's also managed to lose WCW's as well. From combined 10+'s on Monday nights to under 4 in just a few short years. It's really quite remarkable. To think the record industry is in hysterics after being down, what, 13% or something?

 

I stopped watching wrestling more than ten years ago, after growing up on it in the eighties, and only started watching again after Nitro and the NWO made things interesting again. I've been only casually watching it the last year or so, having seen enough of the current "product". My allegiance to the WWE is really only to Austin, Foley and The Rock, and a few of the other guys who entertain me, not to wrestling in general. If I'm one of the hardcore fans (and with around ten years off and on of watching wrestling, what else could you call me) then Vince is in even bigger trouble if he's counting on me to always be there, because once Rock-Austin is over I'm probably gone.

[Guest Super Pissed Smark]

I was just looking for something with a large viewership, but you could easily compare most attitude stroylines to great angles from the past that suffered from weak viewership, and that doesn't make them of lesser quality does it? Austin/Bret, which was losing to the other product, for example.

Austin-Bret was really the turning point, where RAW became better than Nitro, and though it was losing you could just feel the momentum starting to turn and people starting to talk more about the WWF and converting viewers away from WCW, so it did it's job. Comparing those matches to This is Your Life seems like apples and oranges to me. That segment was a testament to Rock and Foley's great chemistry and the fondness that the general viewing public had for them. It also stood out from all the other stuff, and went on for so long it had a chance to build an audience. That Russo couldn't be bothered to come up with a punchline shouldn't be held against people who tuned in to watch it.

 

Scary to think that it took two performers as great as Bret and Steve so much effort to get people to switch over and now Vince thinks he can just throw some necrophilia out there and viewers will come running back.

[Guest JHawk]

Austin-Bret was really the turning point, where RAW became better than Nitro, and though it was losing you could just feel the momentum starting to turn and people starting to talk more about the WWF and converting viewers away from WCW, so it did it's job. Comparing those matches to This is Your Life seems like apples and oranges to me. That segment was a testament to Rock and Foley's great chemistry and the fondness that the general viewing public had for them. It also stood out from all the other stuff, and went on for so long it had a chance to build an audience. That Russo couldn't be bothered to come up with a punchline shouldn't be held against people who tuned in to watch it.

 

Hey, I'm in that group that sat through that entire thing. Did it draw a record cable rating? Yes. But I know a lot of casual fans that stopped watching after that because "Why give 25 minutes to something when nothing happened?" No match, no turn, no "Thanks for the party, Mick." Just "Pancake your ass on out of here" and "The Rock doesn't want your pie."

 

I say it again. High ratings don't necessarily translate to quality.

[Guest EN090]

I say it again. High ratings don't necessarily translate to quality.

 

So who decides what's quality and what's not? Some of you guys may think Bret/Benoit from Nitro99 was quality, and I agree, but what good is it if no one watches?

[Guest RedJed]

I say it again. High ratings don't necessarily translate to quality.

 

So who decides what's quality and what's not? Some of you guys may think Bret/Benoit from Nitro99 was quality, and I agree, but what good is it if no one watches?

Quality is in the eye of the beholder, IMO. Its just a personal opinion more than anything. Saying an angle worked because a billion people saw it doesn't mean....well that it worked or it was even good.

 

Its like saying Hogan is the best wrestler ever because of the revenue he generated back in the day or whatever. He may very well be the biggest name ever in wrestling, but best actual wrestler or worker ever? Of course not.

 

Who cares if not many saw, as your example, Bret v. Benoit? That doesn't take away from the overall quality and enjoyment factor for that bout. You're just basing things from a business perspective.

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

Would Owen vs. Bret be must-see for someone like me or you? Probably. Would it be must-see for the casual fan (the source of cash for the company)? Probably not.

 

Bret/Owen actually drew very well. Not as well as Steve Austin or Hulk Hogan, but it was the best drawing program for the WWF in the dark ages. It wasn't until the WWF moved from Owen/Bret to Diesel/Michaels that the WWF started losing money.

[Guest Dangerous A]

Dude, this is in my freakin marketing textbook!

 

 

“Long-term customer satisfaction leads to the retention of customers and generates substantial profits. It is more profitable for firms to keep customers than to be constantly seeking new ones. Developing satisfied customers is therefore an important way to meet the organization’s performance objectives.” (Sommers/Barnes: Fundamentals of marketing, 9th Canadian Edition)

This is true. Take it from someone who used to hang out with drug dealers and has dabbled in a little "distribution" himself, the key to sustaining your business is the satisfaction of the loyal customers. Casuals come and go, but it's all about the regulars coming back for more and more.

[Guest Smell the ratings!!!]

Heyman is just like ECW, some people have an extreme zeal for everything he's involved with, and other people constantly try to show the first group how wrong they are.

 

But whichever side you're on, it still seems very questionable to fire a writer who's show has generally improved since he started. Especially when you're replacing him with one of his disciples and a writer who already failed unquestionably several years ago.

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

Heyman is just like ECW, some people have an extreme zeal for everything he's involved with, and other people constantly try to show the first group how wrong they are.

 

But whichever side you're on, it still seems very questionable to fire a writer who's show has generally improved since he started. Especially when you're replacing him with one of his disciples and a writer who already failed unquestionably several years ago.

Yeah, that's the thing. I never liked ECW, but I am enjoying Smackdown more than anytime since the Invasion, and it would be a shame if it is ruined due to politics. I can't stand RAW, and if Smackdown goes down the same road I will be forced to quit watching it too.

 

Velocity is good, but I have trouble getting into a B show if the A show sucks. I need to at least know what the wrestlers are doing.

[Guest EN090]

This is true. Take it from someone who used to hang out with drug dealers and has dabbled in a little "distribution" himself, the key to sustaining your business is the satisfaction of the loyal customers. Casuals come and go, but it's all about the regulars coming back for more and more.

 

But what good is it to market to a fanbase that will never increase business? People are complaining that ratings are down but how do you expect them to get back up to where they were by not bringing in casual fans? You can't get 6.5's with just loyal fans.

 

Quality is in the eye of the beholder, IMO. Its just a personal opinion more than anything. Saying an angle worked because a billion people saw it doesn't mean....well that it worked or it was even good.

 

Its like saying Hogan is the best wrestler ever because of the revenue he generated back in the day or whatever. He may very well be the biggest name ever in wrestling, but best actual wrestler or worker ever? Of course not.

 

Who cares if not many saw, as your example, Bret v. Benoit? That doesn't take away from the overall quality and enjoyment factor for that bout. You're just basing things from a business perspective.

 

Okay, I agree that quality is in the eye of the behoolder.

 

But what's the point of putting something on TV if it doesn't matter how many people watch it? The point of a television program is to get people to watch. If people watch it is usually a success. Hogan isn't the best wrestler but he was the best money-maker and at the end of the day, the important thing is that you make money.

[Guest JHawk]

Hogan isn't the best wrestler but he was the best money-maker and at the end of the day, the important thing is that you make money.

 

Agreed. But with the casual fans leaving and many of the loyal fans getting fed up, you can't even break even long enough to get the casual fans back. That's why you need to keep the loyal fans happy.

[Guest EN090]

Agreed. But with the casual fans leaving and many of the loyal fans getting fed up, you can't even break even long enough to get the casual fans back. That's why you need to keep the loyal fans happy.

 

I agree to some extent. But you can't just cater to the loyal viewers forever. Eventually WWE is going to have to try some new things to get the mass audience back or else they might find themselves where they were in 1996.

[Guest creativename]

Agreed. But with the casual fans leaving and many of the loyal fans getting fed up, you can't even break even long enough to get the casual fans back. That's why you need to keep the loyal fans happy.

 

I agree to some extent. But you can't just cater to the loyal viewers forever. Eventually WWE is going to have to try some new things to get the mass audience back or else they might find themselves where they were in 1996.

Of course you can. That's what all businesses try to do. If you cater to the customers you already have, by giving them a quality product, it is inevitable that more customers will come about.

 

This is how the last golden age came about to begin with (it's how almost all business successes come about)--the WWF started providing its customers with a product they enjoyed. They started to actually give the fans what they wanted, rather than trying to simply exploit the "marks" (I think Gorilla Monsoon being President at the time had a lot to do with this--his philosophy was different than that of the old guard).

 

The fact is, when dealing with groups of millions of people (hardcore fans, loyal fans, off-and-ons, casual viewers), people from those groups will generally have a similar opinion on what is entertaining and what isn't; i.e., classic Angle-Benoit match or funny Rock promo is entertaining, a Jackie Gayda match or necrophilia angle isn't. Even people who have never watched wrestling a day in their lives would tend agree on what's good about the product, though the longer you're a fan, the more likely you are to enjoy the subtleties of the actual wresltling itself.

[Guest Brian]

The problem with basing the whole argument on ratings is that the WWE isn't sustained on ratings, they need buyrates and attendance. They don't just have to get people watching, they have to get people to go out and dump their money.

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

The problem with basing the whole argument on ratings is that the WWE isn't sustained on ratings, they need buyrates and attendance. They don't just have to get people watching, they have to get people to go out and dump their money.

I thought that was what we were talking about. People paying to see the product.

[Guest creativename]

The problem with basing the whole argument on ratings is that the WWE isn't sustained on ratings, they need buyrates and attendance. They don't just have to get people watching, they have to get people to go out and dump their money.

You know, I actually posted something on this very board about this a while back. It showed that there is an almost perfect correlation between ratings, buyrates, and attendance. It was something on the order of .96 or greater for each of the pairs. It was a simple linear correlation too, meaning if ratings go up 20%, you can expect attendance to go up 20%.

 

So, they're all the essentially same thing. Which makes perfect sense.

[Guest RedJed]

Heyman is just like ECW, some people have an extreme zeal for everything he's involved with, and other people constantly try to show the first group how wrong they are.

 

But whichever side you're on, it still seems very questionable to fire a writer who's show has generally improved since he started. Especially when you're replacing him with one of his disciples and a writer who already failed unquestionably several years ago.

Amen, thats what this discussion was all about in the first place (just how it didn't make sense how he was demoted considering the Smackdown show improved since he started on it, regardless of your feelings towards the guy) and then I'm not sure what happened lol

[Guest Brian]

They still look almost the same aside from the better wrestlers being on one show.