The new Bellator TV deal exponentially increases the maximum exposure potential for Bellator: moving them from the 5 million viewership at ESPN Deportes to the combined 100 million range with Fox SN, NBC, and Telemundo.
Bellator started out with the strategy of not only being the first tournament based organization, but also the first to specifically target the latin market. It will be interesting to see – even despite the sizeable step-up on Telemundo – whether they’re focus remains with the latin demographic.
While the potential viewership of the deal is certainly a landmark, the timeslots still leave something to be desired (although in complete fairness, no one expected to get primetime out of NBC). The deal calls for primetime on Thursdays on Fox Sports, but the recap episodes on NBC and Telemundo – the stations with the greatest potential to draw new viewers for MMA – will be shown late at night.
The deal certainly isn’t earth shattering, nor was it expected to be. However, it does provide Bellator with a significant growth opportunity not just in potential exposure, but also in timeslot advancement. If Bellator can generate good ratings for NBC, they may get pushed up to a better time or more favourable day of the week.
“Bellator started out with the strategy of not only being the first tournament based organization…”
UFC under WOW Promotions/SEG ownership was the first North American TOURNAMENT BASED MMA organization 16 years ago. I mean c’mon, it’s the UFC!
Why are you using a 250 million combined homes number? That’s extremely misleading. There are only 115 million TV-equipped households in the United States.
You do realize they have an infomercial spot on NBC right??? The chances of NBC giving them a better spot are about as good as the “how to detox and cleanse your intestines” getting primetime.
Do those infomercials have demographics?
Will it be live on THURSDAYS? All Bellator’s previous events were held on Fridays. How would this even work live event wise (how many people can go out to a fight on a Thursday night, or would even want to)? I hope they don’t show the fights significantly later than they actually happen; we all remember how the IFL never had live fights on FSN and it was ridiculous. Precedent for failure!
I wonder how different their late night NBC slot is from the one the StrikeForce used to have? That early sunday morning (3 AM Sundays?) turned out to actually be a time buy by StrikeForce to get on NBC and not an actual NBC show…similar to an infomercial. dojo makes a good point that if this is the case here for Bellator, there is little to no chance of NBC moving them.
Good job by Bellator. Baby steps. Baby steps. Those complaining expect too much from a company who just started putting on shows for only a year or so.