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WWE Wants To Attract Younger Audience
During WWE’s Q4 earnings call, the company’s President and Chief Revenue Officer Nick Khan touched on WWE’s declining viewership and how it doesn’t necessarily reflect the amount of people watching their product.
“In all my time in LA, since SmackDown started in October 2019, through when I moved to Connecticut, I watched every episode of SmackDown live on the app,” said Khan in an interview with Alfred Konuwa of Forbes
“So my viewership, your viewership, are not counted in the ratings. So it’s not simply ‘hey there is a departure, people are watching on YouTube, Facebook etc. people are watching the direct-to-consumer product, which only Fox knows how many folks are actually watching that. Fox seems quite pleased to us with the overall viewership and that’s the nuance in what I was attempting to say [during the earnings call].”
WWE’s median audience age has doubled since 2000, with the weekly viewership leaning towards males over the age of 50. Khan discussed WWE’s strategies in attempting to reach a younger demographic, and how having Bad Bunny on RAW is helping them achieve the goal.
“That’s a lifelong, career-long desire. No matter when people start watching, they’re always going to obviously get older, so you always have to figure out a new way to get young people in,” said Khan.
Khan also confirmed WWE has its eyes on music star Cardi B, who has been vocal about past interest in the product. WWE featured her in a WWE Now video, teasing a possible Wrestlemania appearance.
“Yes, and specifically the two that you just mentioned,” Khan stated, referring to Bad Bunny and Cardi B “Obviously, there is no touring right now, so the ability to get Bad Bunny for however long this run is going to be—and you’re going to see a lot of him—I don’t believe that would have existed in a world where Bad Bunny was on tour. That’s going to be a continual effort, so we’re always going to watch Bad Bunny, Cardi B to get involved.”
He also revealed WWE’s plans to developing animated properties, for children aged 2 -6, and reevaluating its gaming strategy.
“So, what we’re in the middle of—the bad Bunny thing…that’s obviously tailored towards a young audience. We’re in the process now of developing a number of different animated properties, some with the desired demographic of two to six years old, so the thought is to get kids in young. We’re also reevaluating our entire gaming strategy. So I’m not convinced that there are a group of 15-year-olds watching linear television who just don’t happen to be watching us. They’re finding our content elsewhere, and we have to get to them before they’re even 15, to make sure we have a chance to win over new fans so when the other fans start to phase out and get older, we always have a new population coming in.”
One of the strategies already seems to be working, as Bad Bunny’s merchandise on WWEShop is the best selling collection in 2021 so far.