Purist MMA people find it irksome to have UFC linked with WWE, but there's no doubt about it, MMA's global success was based off of what Vince McMahon did with pro wrestling. The only real difference is that what happens in the ring is fake in WWE, whereas the fighting is real in MMA. Everything else, the pay per view format, the weekly TV shows, the personal feuds to sell fights, is all learned from WWE's successes. Dana White admits this, saying McMahon is an "animal" he looked up to and copied the UFC business model from, "He's the guy that basically created the pay-per-view market." In many ways the WWE really helped to ensure the UFC's success. Spike TV came to McMahon in 2005 and asked him if he would mind a UFC show following on from the ending of his Monday Night Raw show. Not seeing the UFC as competition (and it wasn't at the time) McMahon said no problem. In retrospect given how WWE PPV's would decline and UFC PPV's would boom, maybe Vince should have said no. What happened was Raw fans stuck around and discovered this far more compelling conflict based drama. The UFC had been on it's last legs, The Ultimate Fighter was a final gamble to find an audience. It worked. The MMA boom started and Vince McMahon had indirectly played a huge role in it.
