Why Ring of Honor Will Fail

Let me preface this column by stating that Ring of Honor is far and away my favorite wrestling promotion. Every time I go to a Ring of Honor show, I am overwhelmed by the amazing performances put forth by the wrestlers. Tickets are always cheap, so I have no problem getting a seat just a few feet from the ring. And every time I buy a DVD, I enjoy every minute of it. That's why it saddens me to see how Ring of Honor handles its business. Some of the problems, they can't do much about. But a lot of problems stem from a lack of understanding of their audience and how to market itself properly. At worst, if these problems continue, Ring of Honor will end to exist as a promotion. At best, they won't gain any ground. Here is an examination of the problems currently facing Ring of Honor.

Wrestlers need money, not fans. Perhaps the biggest problem that Ring of Honor faces as a popular independent promotion is that their wrestlers get a lot of exposure. While this has its advantages, it also is the source of a scourge. Any wrestler who works his way through the Ring of Honor ranks, and has the kind of potential to put Ring of Honor on his back and carry them to new markets, bigger audiences, and higher revenue will be sought after by other promotions. In particular, TNA and WWE have signed, and will continue to sign wrestlers who shine in ROH. One needs to look no further than C.M. Punk, James Gibson, and Brian Kendrick to see some very potent examples of ROH wrestlers who have signed with WWE. Furthermore, Samoa Joe, Christopher Daniels, Alex Shelley, Austin Aries, and Rodderick Strong are being featured prominently on TNA. As TNA begins a new era with their first prime time TV slot, it's possible that in a years time, said wrestlers will no longer be able to split time between TNA and ROH, and will have to choose one over the other.

The offer of money made by TNA and WWE far outweighs the drawbacks of working for those companies. While most ROH wrestlers who go to WWE will never see much time on TV, and if they do, they'll likely be jobbing to larger wrestlers who have the WWE look, the money is far more than they'll ever get with ROH. It's hard to turn down a salary that could be anywhere from five to ten times what you make in one year, even if you're known, or appreciated by the fans the way you are in ROH. WWE fans will never appreciate James Gibson the way ROH fans do, but ROH fans will never make a mortgage a thing of the past. TNA offers less money to the ROH troopers than WWE, but soon enough, TNA will decide that some of the part-timers they have on their roster should become TNA exclusives, to help bolster their fledgling TV product. Moreover, they'll make the appropriate investment to convince the wrestlers to make a permanent switch. It won't be long before there are two buckets dipping into the ROH well. What's worse, there's nothing ROH can do about losing the talent they spend time and money establishing.

ROH caters to a niche of a niche market. The professional wrestling market is a niche. A small percentage of people in the United States watch, let alone spend money on wrestling. As Dusty Giebink pointed out in his column last week, the best way to capture that market is with personality, not in ring wrestling. That does not mean that there isn't a niche within the niche for those who prefer in ring performances to outlandish personalities and soap opera storylines. Ring of Honor caters to wrestling fans who would rather watch an exciting, athletic, well performed, and interestingly scripted match, than the spectacle of sports entertainment. While these fans are often rabid, and quick to support ROH financially, they are a very small market, and will continue to be small. The answer seems simple enough. Cater to the larger market, right? But how can Ring of Honor cater to the sports entertainment fans, without alienating their fervent workrate junkies? It's a slow, arduous process with many pitfalls. ROH has made some ginger footed attempts at presenting more sensational storylines, with some mixed reviews from their fans. There's no blueprint for this transition, no historical basis. It's an ongoing experiment, which is just as likely to fail as it is to succeed. If it was the only thing ROH had to worry about, those would be good odds. However, when you consider the other problems plaguing ROH, the percentages drop.

When it comes to technology, ROH is backward. Let me say this outright: the Ring of Honor website is inadequate. A promotion which can thank internet access for the majority of its fans should have an outstanding website. Their site, currently, is too simply designed. If I tell a wrestling fan to go to www.rohwrestling.com and buy a DVD, one look at the site is going to tell them it's not a top notch operation. The first thing you see on the site is the ROH logo, followed directly by Paul Heyman's face. Look across the faces in that row, and you see Shawn Michaels as well. It makes ROH look like imitators, who don't even believe in their product enough to push it above everything else they sell. You need to scroll down halfway through the page to see a list of events. In general, the site needs redesign in a major way.

Web design issues aside, ROH simply does not understand the power of the internet. They've just recently put up a video clip of their wrestlers showing off their best moves. While they do have promo videos for their upcoming shows, they consist of little more than Bobby Cruise standing in front of an ROH banner and talking as quickly as possible. ROH should be putting highlight clips of their most recent shows on the site each and every month. If I, as a fan, could direct other wrestling fans who are not familiar to ROH to clips of their most recent shows, it would be the best kind of word of mouth advertising they could get.

Finally, ROH needs to get their product to DVD much quicker than they do. Currently, I have to wait up to as much as three months to purchase the DVD of a show. Since I, like many people, have forgone the VCR for the DVD player, it makes no sense for me to purchase a VHS tape. Furthermore, even if I had a VCR, I wouldn't want to own a tape when I know I can get a DVD with a listing of matches, and the ability to quickly move back and forth between matches. The problem, of course, is that by the time a new DVD has been put out, the event is already months old. While the matches are still good, I feel what I'm watching has no pertinence to the current product. It's fine for ROH to put out both VHS and DVD versions of their product, but they need to figure out how to get DVDs out within one month's time.

Marketing is an opportunity, not a chore. James Guttman already spoke in his audio update last week about the sub par commercial that Ring of Honor aired during Raw for tomorrow night's Long Island show. The quality and content of the advertisement made them look third rate, according to JG. It's a shame, because at that moment, ROH had the opportunity to wow every wrestling fan in the area with their amazing in-ring content. All they needed to do was air clips of hot ROH shows in the past, such as C.M. Punk farewell event in Chicago Ridge. Further evidence of a lack of marketing skill comes from my last live ROH event, wherein ROH officials were handing out flyers for their website. Now, if 90% of fans in Chicago Ridge didn't hear about ROH through the internet in the first place, I'd be shocked. What if those flyers instead contained a coupon for a 5% discount for anyone who bought one piece of merchandise and signed up for a pre-order of a DVD from that night's show? Wouldn't that be more effective? ROH needs to begin thinking creatively about their marketing tactics. Marketing isn't something they have to do, it's something they should be salivating over.

For example, ROH needs to use its most vital resource; its rabid fan base. ROH could take two steps that would help increase sales, and help endear fans to the promotion. The first step is simple. Create an active database of all names and addresses that have bought ROH content online. The second step involves giving fans the opportunity to help ROH, and themselves. At one or two shows per year per arena, ROH can set up a table were fans join a "street team." Each street team member is given a unique participation code, and a flyer template. The street team member can use word of mouth, or photocopies of his/her flyer to advertise ROH products through the website and phone number. Each new ROH customer citing the participation code with their first purchase receives a 5 or 10% discount on the entire purchase. In turn, for every 5 new customers a street team member creates, they get a free tee shirt or DVD. For every ten customers, they get an autographed piece of merchandise. For every twenty, they get a free ringside ticket for the next event in their area, etc . . . Partnerships like this not only help increase sales, but help create attachment and involvement in the fan base. Simple marketing ideas like this, effectively used by up and coming musicians for years, can help ROH make the most of their niche of a niche market. Unless ROH gets with the times and starts marketing like a real flourishing business would, they'll never effectively expand their markets at the rate at which they need.

Of course, ROH does not have the staunch financial backing that companies like TNA (currently) and WCW had during its short lifespan. They need to worry about the day to day business of the company, and they have fewer people to take care of those aspects. However, Ring of Honor still needs to spend significant time looking ahead. Just as they might book a storyline payoff months in advance, they need to start thinking long term about who their stars will be, how they represent themselves as a company, and how they can expand their business. As long as ROH treats itself like a small time promotion, with small time aspirations, that's exactly what they'll remain. Once they realize that they have more potential as cutting edge business, fully utilizing the power of the internet, using creative marketing tactics to gain an edge, the other things will fall in place. They'll gain a larger portion of the wrestling market, and once they've got that, they'll have the cash to start holding on to their star wrestlers. It's an uphill slide really, but they must start now, otherwise at best, they'll remain stagnant, and at worst, they'll fall victim to the potent one-two combination of TNA and WWE.

I can think of only one or two names off the top of my head who wrestle because it's wrestling and not just for a paycheck: Sting and Bret Hart.

On 09/17/05 at 00:43:27, Anubis wrote:I can think of only one or two names off the top of my head who wrestle because it's wrestling and not just for a paycheck: Sting and Bret Hart.

On 09/17/05 at 01:26:10, Snabbit888 wrote:Where do you go to school, Psymin? I'm getting my undergraduate degree in Acting as well.

With a few million dollars in the bank for a rainy day

I'm at Indiana State University in Terre Haute, IN.