The UFC 106 Prelims on SpikeTV drew an average 1.3 million viewers last Saturday for a household rating of 1.0. It also delivered more in the key demographics than college football on the same night:
“UFC 106 Prelims” on Spike TV delivered 1.3 million viewers and a 1.0 household rating on Saturday, November 21 (9:00-10:00pm ET/PT). The one-hour broadcast delivered more Men 18-34 and 18-49 than ESPN’s college football telecast of Kansas St. vs. Nebraska that same evening.
UFC 106 Prelims on Spike TV
583,000 Men 18-49
284,000 Men 18-34
ESPN College Football
484,000 Men 18-49
253,000 Men 18-34
Payout Perspective:
The results have been pretty consistent with the UFC’s Prelim broadcasts over the past three events: 1.3-1.4 million viewers and a 1.0 HH rating. Is it helping the PPV? Perhaps, but only marginally. UFC 102 did not have the benefit of a prelim show, and still drew more than 103, but slightly less than 104. However, as we’ve pointed out previously, there are other benefits to running the prelims: such as exposure for younger fighters.
I think when looking at these ratings we need to keep in mind that people gather and watch UFC PPVs in groups of people. Whether that be to split the cost of the PPV or to make a party of watching the event with friends.
For example at my house for every PPV we gather for we have been watching the prelims on Spike in a group of at least 7 people.
I don’t understand why the prelims weren’t live on the West Coast… or were they? I sat down at 9:00 p.m. in California to watch them on Spike but they were nowhere to be found. Instead some police videos show was on. Anyone else in the Pacific time zone notice this? Kind of seems like it would’ve undermined the purpose of providing lead-in programming to the ppv in the Pacific region showing them at 9:00 pm anyway, when the PPV was already two thirds over. Maybe they were on at six as with previous shows, but this certainly wasn’t advertised.
The free prelims are becoming a problem and the UFC needs to address it. I watched the PPV with 5 other people. We all come away thinking this was one of the worst PPVs in a very long time. After looking back i realized it was the fights per say. It was a combination of “our” fighters losing and most importantly the UFC choosing to re-air the prelims during the PPV after they already aired on Spike. This left us uninterested in the fight a second time and caused us to not pay attention to the broadcast.
The problem here is we dont know when and if they will re-air the prelims. Does the UFC want PPV buying fans to watch the Spike prelims and increase ratings? Are they expecting the Prelims to draw in PPVs buys? In that case why reshow these fights? It would be easy not to watch the prelims but then they may choose not to show them. So you are tricked into seeing them 2 times or not at all. Seeing them 2 times specifically when they are uneventful. Really ruins the entertainment value of the program.