Linda McMahon

October 2008

They go by the names Ray Mysterio, Santino Marella and Michelle McCool. They are some of the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) superstars, and a huge business has been built around them. WWE’s television programming can be seen in more than 130 countries. And the pay-per-view event WrestleMania has achieved more than 1 million buys worldwide annually for the past several years. Linda McMahon talks about WWE’s extensive multiplatform reach.

WS: What makes WWE resonate with audiences so strongly and in so many different countries?
McMAHON: WWE is really about human emotion and passion, whether the story lines within our programming capture business rivalries or professional jealousies or sibling rivalries. And sometimes there has even been the McMahon family involved with husband and wife rivalries! And they are acted out on our stage, which is a 20-foot-by-20-foot ring. There are the interviews that take place backstage that set the tone for what’s going on, then there’s the actual match that adds the sports element, then there is the contact side in the ring, but it’s still all entertainment. It translates across every language and across so many ages because there really is something for everyone at a WWE event. There’s action, there’s pyrotechnics, there’s music, there’s some vaudeville. We even have weddings in our shows. We capture every aspect of human emotion and for all age groups, and if we’ve done our job well, we’ve put a lot of smiles on people’s faces.

WS: What are the various elements that are driving the business?
McMAHON: It’s really based on content. If we’ve developed compelling content that makes our fans want to watch and come to our live events—that is the key secret to our success. We distribute that programming, and we are then able to develop all the underlying assets, which include our licensing business, live events, publishing and music. All of those elements really stem from the creative side of the business. We create the compelling content our fans want to watch, and then they want to buy our products. Advertisers want to advertise within our show and, God bless this, it grows on a global basis!

WS: Your content has migrated relatively easily to the online world and to mobile phones.
McMAHON: It does lend itself to different kinds of editing, but I think the ease of getting on those platforms is important, too. We own our content, so we are able to very quickly edit it in ways that make sense for mobile, for broadband, for cable, for broadcast. And we’re able, very quickly, to create content that can migrate to those different platforms.

WS: Many of the same companies that advertise in your TV shows have also advertised on your website.
McMAHON: We’re seeing the same demographics online that we see within our television program. We have that real sweet spot of the 14-to-24 male demo, and our fans are already interactive. If you watch the audience in our television show, they’re holding up signs, they’re participating back and forth with the superstars who are in the ring, so it’s live-action, interactive entertainment. That bodes well for online. The audience is there, too, and the advertisers Follow @ . A lot of video games, action movies, men’s grooming products that advertise within our program—we have Sony and Gillette—are online, as well. Our unique visitors keep growing, and we are delivering the fan base our advertisers want to reach.

WS: Your pay-per-view business has also been quite strong. Do you see that outpacing program sales to international broadcasters?
McMAHON: Well, it won’t outpace the sale to international broadcasters simply because in a lot of countries, the pay-per-view technology is not there for our fans who are online or watching on television. So as pay per view grows, we do have more and more fans who are prepared to spend money to watch something that is a premium television product. In a lot of markets that are not pay-per-view ready, we’ve sold many of our pay per views as television specials.

WS: Tell us about WWE Studios.
McMAHON: We are developing product; not only film for theatrical release, but also for direct to video and for television. It’s really good to showcase our superstars to a wider audience. We’ll probably develop reality series for television, scripted and unscripted. It’s in keeping with our philosophy of creating interactive television, not only for our fan base, but to broaden the footprint because our superstars will interact with stars of other media, too.

WS: How is your international business doing, and what is the potential for continued growth?
McMAHON: It is doing very well. Our office in the U.K. is our largest international office; it focuses on EMEA—Europe, the Middle East and Africa—then we have offices in Shanghai, Tokyo, Sydney, São Paulo and in Toronto. Our formula for success has been very straightforward. We introduce our product via television and develop the fan base. It is easy to then follow with all of the other assets. But we need people on the ground in those markets who know the local culture and who also have the local contacts. Our international [business accounts for] about 25 percent of our revenues. We expect to [increase that] to 30 percent in the next three years. It’s growing at a good, steady pace.

WS: You have recently entered a partnership with Mattel.
McMAHON: Our new deal with Mattel, which starts in 2010, is exciting for us, considering the great global reach that Mattel has. It is mutually advantageous because we are going to be the primary boys category for Mattel. They are very strong with Barbie and have different well-developed categories for girls. The one thing they didn’t have as well developed is their boys’ categories. We’ve already talked about working with them on some of their prosocial activities. I think it’s going to be an excellent partnership, tying in sponsors, looking at animation, really driving our brand through this younger demo, which coincides incredibly well with our kids’ initiative, where we’ve launched a new WWE Kids magazine. It comes out bimonthly. And we recently launched our WWE Kids website so we are tying all of that together with Mattel and then looking at potential sponsors and advertisers.
I love the kids’ site and magazine because it is really “edutainment.” It entertains kids, but it educates them at the same time. For instance, when we’re talking about our tours going around the world, we have funny things on the maps to show kids where we are in different parts of the world. Or there may be the question: I am going to have a wrestling match on the moon, what am I going to need? And one of the answers would be gravity boots, so you are teaching a little science.
It’s just a fabulous new initiative for us. It is something I’ve wanted to do for a long, long time. It has information on exercise and the proper foods to eat, so it’s a really good mom-friendly and kid-friendly magazine. It will help across the deal with Mattel, which I believe is going to be awesome business.

WS: You mentioned prosocial. You have several of these initiatives.
McMAHON: We want to reach out to one part of our audience, which is the military. The chairman of our company, Vince McMahon, for the past five years, during the Christmas holidays, has taken our superstars on tour and we do a show on one of the military bases. We were in Baghdad last year. We’ve been in Afghanistan. It’s been great to allow our troops to send messages back home and for some of the families at home to see their loved ones.
We also have “Smackdown Your Vote!” which is part of an initiative we’ve had since 2000 to help young people understand the importance of registering and voting. We are not trying to dictate how to vote. We are just saying, you are the future, you need to register. We work with the National Association of Secretaries of State and a couple of media groups to really spread the word.
We work quite a bit with Make-A-Wish Foundation in the U.S. and we’ve done a couple of events in the U.K. And we have an educational program, which I dearly love, it’s “Get R.E.A.L. (Respect, Education, Achievement, Leadership).” Some of our superstars are on posters that are distributed to school libraries across the country, encouraging young people to read, and our superstars will go to schools and sit in reading circles and read with young people. Our superstars will also go into schools and talk about staying in school and saying no to drugs. That’s a terrific program, and when you talk about how our brand has grown and why we have stability in our company, I think it is because while we’re global in reach, we are local in execution. We come into your community. We work with different organizations. That’s very important because it makes us feel good. It’s part and parcel of what makes our company the unique company that it is, why it translates globally, why the people who work with us really enjoy what they do, because they see all of the different aspects and all the ways we touch our fans.