10 Imminent Problems WWE Is Facing
The product is better, but the future's not exactly bright...
WrestleMania 32 may have gotten panned by fans, but just about everyone agrees that since the show, WWE's product has been better. Though the company has still been insistent on pushing Roman Reigns at the expense of more popular stars (at least until this week), the "new era" that's been carrying Raw for the past few months has truly changed the program for the better.
The days of Triple H cutting 20-minute promos on the show are gone, at least for now. In their place are matches featuring Kevin Owens, the returned Cesaro, the newly-debuted Sami Zayn, and the once-again-fresh Chris Jericho. The New Day have become the most popular superstars in the company after a face turn. The Club's feud with John Cena has captured fans' imaginations. Even The Miz is doing his best work in years.
Still, for all there is for fans to appreciate, WWE's higher-ups can't rest on their laurels. Any success they've achieved is tenuous, and failure can be right around the corner. Given the fact that the company will be structurally reorganized during the upcoming brand split, particular care must be taken by decision-makers to ensure that things keep working.
These are the 10 imminent problems WWE is facing. They may not be unavoidable, but they'll require some ingenuity to get around.
10. A Drop In Network Subscribers
In an attempt to entice new viewers into signing up for the WWE Network, the company has long been advertising that first-time subscribers get their first month of the service for free. This was played up huge during the month of March, as that meant those trying out the Network would have access to WrestleMania 32 at absolutely no cost. WWE pushed the "#FreeWrestleMania" campaign at just about every opportunity.
It was a success. The day after WrestleMania 32, the company announced that they had 1.82 million active subscribers - a new record by hundreds of thousands.
The company's next subscriber announcement is coming up in early July, and it's expected that the Network numbers will have fallen quite a bit from the post-WrestleMania announcement. Typically, the WWE Network has a pretty good retention rate when it comes to keeping customers who took advantage of the free month, but the sheer number of people who signed up during the #FreeWrestleMania fervor may bring back memories of the discrepancies between WrestleMania buys and other shows' buys during the days of Pay-Per-View.
The dropoff will be mostly superficial, with the Network still showing good year-on-year growth, but there's no telling how it will affect stock prices.