10 Ways WWE Could Sell More Network Subscriptions

The Network, upon its initial 2014 launch, seemed like a winning, inevitable idea.

PPV was in an apparent decline. This was a reflection of the product, not the platform, if UFC's numbers are any indication. Streaming services across the wider entertainment sphere had grown to prominence, weakening the physical home video market. WWE - specifically George Barrios - grasped the change in the market (if only he doubled in Creative).

WWE touted the success of the Network in a corporate release published in April of this year, in which it unveiled a record subscriber count of 2.1 million. This is a somewhat misleading and euphemistic figure, in that it does not account for the inevitable post-WrestleMania drop-off and is in no way analogous to the buy rate metrics of the old paradigm. Four years in, and WWE has not yet emulated, much less outstripped, the revenue generated via pay-per-view. The Network generates significantly less revenue than television rights fees even now, much less 2020, the year in which we will formally go backwards.

If nothing else, switching storyline emphasis from the "conclusive" PPV battleground to TV would require far too much of a philosophical creative upheaval for a promotion mired in formula. For now, then, WWE must reconsider a Network framework peaking in its current incarnation.

To do that, recording two tired wrestlers conversing in a car is probably not the answer...

WWE alienated generations of wrestling fans when it monopolised the industry in 2001, and subsequently homogenised its in-ring style and relied on turgid, lame storytelling formula. Only now is the landscape diversifying beyond the fringe, enrapturing a set of disenchanted WWE fans in the process.

Per DEFY Wrestling's Matt Farmer, legions more residual territorial fans remain disenchanted. As he explained, prior to WrestleMania I, "In 1984, there were approximately 300 events around the globe that drew in the neighbourhood of ten thousand or more fans." On the basis of this objective analysis, WWE didn't "expand" the business, per their own revisionist rhetoric; they shrunk and reimagined it through their own, all-encompassing lens. WWE is the the most popular wrestling company ever, but wrestling itself was once more popular. It was also once far more diverse, accounting for that popularity. The rabid Memphians loved bloody brawls, Floridians legit shooting tough men, Tennesseans high-flying athletes.

To lull those lapsed fans back into the fold, a comprehensively-researched, deeply analytical and expansive docu-series on those halcyon days may tap into a burning nostalgia felt by those who lived through them, and reward the historical fascination of new fans alike. To put it over as a legitimate account, WWE could draft in genuine, objective historians, potentially drawing a level of acclaim (and thus intrigue) on the level of HBO's André The Giant special. WWE possesses the footage.

The motivation?

It's an optimistic suggestion, since it betrays the very euphemism on which WWE was built. But, ultimately, it represents another means of pulling in every wrestling fan - the ultimate endgame - without doling out daft money to the Elite.