What F1 could learn from WWE

You are not about to read a list of suggestions that will include Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg settling their differences by seeing who can throw the other one through a table first, although given the fuss that was made over a thrown cap last year, perhaps that would be a ratings hit.

And this is not a call for Formula 1 to script races - the element that earns World Wrestling Entertainment the tag of being 'fake'. While 'professional wrestling' is certainly not a real sport, there is plenty Formula 1 could learn from what it does so well.

Unfortunately, the company's three letters are usually only dragged out when people want to make negative comparisons, with high-degradation Pirelli tyres and the double-points finale in 2014 two targets in F1's recent history.

But despite the pretence involved, the world of wrestling must accentuate the elements that make real sports so great. Sometimes, this is what is overlooked in genuinely competitive arenas.

Take rivalries, for example. Rivalry is one of the cornerstones of sporting intrigue. Football (soccer) wouldn't be the global phenomenon it is without the tribalistic nature of supporting a team, even more so when that team has a fierce rival. Success for your enemies can be as painful as defeat for your own team. Some would argue it goes too far, but to most it's just one of many crucial factors that makes football matter to them.

Grand Prix racing is no different. Ayrton Senna vs Alain Prost is its most infamous rivalry and put F1 at the forefront of the sporting world. James Hunt versus Niki Lauda did the same in very different circumstances in the 1970s, while Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill gave us another taste of it in the 1990s.

But since then, what have we had? Mika Hakkinen was too classy to get embroiled in all-out warfare with Schumacher, who had to wait until Fernando Alonso and Renault came along in 2005 before he again met his match on-track. Juan Pablo Montoya certainly had the fire in him to be a spectacular foe for Schumacher, but he rarely had the machinery at his disposal to do so.

All we've been left with in recent years are flashpoints. McLaren's scandalous 2007 season gave us a few months of controversy with Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton, while Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber fell out on occasion during Red Bull's best years.

Gimmick comparisons to WWE are common, but there are lessons F1 can learn from wrestling © LAT

The tension between Hamilton and Rosberg at Mercedes has been obvious during the past two years, but it has rarely bubbled to the surface. And when it last happened, people went wild because caps were thrown.

Perhaps the reason those most recent rivalries have never been able to catch the imagination is because they've occurred inside a team, which has sponsors, owners or even board members to keep happy - the sorts of people who do not subscribe to the 'no such thing as bad publicity' school of thought.

So Vettel and Webber had to pose for that cringeworthy shoulder-shrugging picture after they collided in Turkey in 2010 and Hamilton and Rosberg can only drop the odd coded barb about each other.

But why? Surely two of the fastest men in fiery combat would be perfect for Red Bull, which portrays itself as edgy and cool, to gain exposure and pull in more fans. This worked very well for Marlboro during the Senna/Prost years.

And is anyone going to decide against buying a Mercedes road car because Hamilton and Rosberg aren't best buddies? Does that reflect badly on the products of title sponsor Petronas? Surely a technology company like BlackBerry could do with F1 having an edgier human element to attract more attention?

In that 'fake' sport of wrestling, when a rivalry gets 'hot' everyone makes more money. Hulk Hogan vs Andre The Giant, Bret Hart vs Shawn Michaels (a feud that certainly wasn't fake, Google their names and 'Montreal 1997' if you're interested in a scandal), The Rock vs Steve Austin, or John Cena vs CM Punk were all cash cows for WWE. Ratings went up, as did pay-per-view buy-rates and so did a revenue stream too often overlooked by F1: merchandise sales.

F1 must not manufacture controversy, but the fact an entertainment business loosely based on sport successful builds its popularity on rivalries is all the evidence you need. F1 is wrong to be afraid of controversy.

As for there being no such thing as bad publicity, Mercedes motorsport boss Toto Wolff even hinted at coming round to such a conclusion late last year, so perhaps all is not lost.

"I've changed my opinion of Formula 1," Wolff told our chief F1 correspondent Ian Parkes in December, when addressing "laughable" speculation that he had fallen out with Mercedes non-executive chairman Niki Lauda.

"The controversy off-track, some of the stuff you read in the newspapers is still causing headlines, so maybe that is a necessary part of Formula 1."

Could F1 make more of its rivalries to improve its popularity? © XPB

Wolff wasn't talking about driver rivalries here, but he had plenty to say on that subject around the same time, issuing some very firm warnings to his drivers ahead of what is likely to be their third consecutive season of fighting each other at the front.

And, what do you know? That generated huge interest and was a welcome off-season story in the weeks that followed the 2015 finale. Mercedes dominated the headlines, pictures of its cars and logo-clad drivers were everywhere, and the stories contained reminders of just how dominant the team was for a second consecutive season. Huge exposure without even turning a wheel.

So if controversy "creates headlines", why not loosen the shackles on Hamilton and Rosberg?

Mercedes sometimes takes a bashing for its dominance making F1 boring over the last two years, and Autosport's traffic numbers show that stories about the Silver Arrows during the season are rarely as popular as the other major teams. But the numbers explode if people get a sniff of Hamilton and Rosberg falling out. So how about taking a little longer before setting off the fire extinguishers?

And WWE has achieved plenty of other things 'off-track' that F1 would do well to follow, notably getting itself on the New York Stock Exchange in late-1999. F1's attempts to achieve something similar have so far come to naught.

WWE also jumped on the social media bandwagon long before F1, although the latter's efforts, particularly in the last 12 months, to overcome Bernie Ecclestone's indifference towards the platform, should be applauded. But the numbers tell their own story: @WWE has 5.9million followers on Twitter to @F1's 1.7m. WWE has an eye-watering 29.4m Facebook followers. Now try to find an official F1 page on Facebook...

On YouTube, WWE boasts 9.3m subscribers, and in December 2015 it was the second-most viewed channel worldwide on the site - only behind Justin Bieber. Latecomer F1, meanwhile, has 123,500 subscribers, and is still working out how best to exploit YouTube while trying to protect the rights it charges broadcasters a fortune for. More lessons to be learned there, then.

In 2014, WWE launched its own Netflix-style online video streaming service, called the WWE Network, charging subscribers a monthly fee ($9.99 or £9.99 in the US and UK, for example) for access to full broadcasts/documentaries from a huge archive. On top of that, there are exclusive new programmes, and its monthly mega-shows that were previously only available on pay-per-view at much higher prices.

WWE's own video service has been a hit with fans, but F1's coverage lags some way behind © LAT

It still has other high-profile weekly shows broadcast on conventional TV to bring in rights money and advertising revenue, with short highlights clips, additional footage/interviews and 'Top 10 moments'-style rundowns all appearing on YouTube very soon after those programmes finish. So it avoids the trap of completely fencing itself off only on premium subscriber-only channels.

For F1 to copy that model it would need a format change, with certain events/sessions (or possibly a qualifying race?) available on conventional TV to keep attracting new fans. Then the main event, plus exclusive new programming and the extensive archive material that we know is housed by Formula One Management, is reserved for those paying for the premium service.

When numbers were last divulged in late-2015, WWE network had attracted nearly 2.5million subscribers during its first 18 months, with 1.2million of those still active at the end of September.

A similar kind of idea has been pitched to Ecclestone for F1, as McLaren racing director Eric Boullier told F1 Racing in the summer when the results of the fan survey it carried out in association with Autosport and Motorsport News were revealed.

"If you gave everyone in the world access to everything to do with Formula 1 for $5 a month, I'm sure more than 200million people will pay and that would give you a $1billion revenue every month," said Boullier. "I've told Bernie Ecclestone this and I've said you have to move the business from what we currently have."

Whatever your take on Boullier's estimated figure of 200million likely subscribers to such a service, the point he's making is great. The days of sports rights being worth millions to TV companies are surely numbered, so F1's business model in that area - somewhere it was a pioneer in the 1980s - needs to move with the times. Playing catch-up on social media is one thing, but missing whatever the next big cash cow is in broadcasting could prove financially disastrous.

On the subject of paying for 'internet' coverage of F1, 56.6 per cent of the near-35,000 respondents to our fan survey in the summer expressed a willingness to pay for the ability to download or stream races to a phone, tablet or computer. Perhaps many would view Boullier's suggestion as a lesser evil than paying megabucks for conventional TV packages.

MotoGP already boasts such a package, although details of how successful its 'Video Pass' service - which includes live race weekend coverage, press conferences, interviews, video footage from testing and a classic race archive dating back to 1992 - are hard to find.

Premium media is available elsewhere in motorsport - although the success of MotoGP's offering is unclear

In fact, if you search for information on the service, the main thing you will find is complaints about the price: €199, or just over £150 for a full season. Should F1 eventually follow a similar model, perhaps Boullier's idea to set the price low to get more people signed up would be a good starting point.

This is not just about pointing out what F1 does wrong and WWE does right, though. In fact, one of the biggest lessons F1 could learn right now comes from something the wrestling world's chiefs have got wrong in recent years.

Since wrestling was proven, once and for all, to be 'fake' thanks to a series of expose documentaries and reports shortly before the turn of the century, WWE has gradually adapted to the fact its fans are in the know. Once it had 'pulled back the curtain' to give fans a glimpse of what really went on, it went very honest, admitting that the majority of its major decisions would be made based on what the fans want. However, over time this has made the most hardcore of fans turn on WWE whenever it's not giving them what they want - ie not having the 'right' people winning matches or titles.

The nadir came in March 2014 when social media campaigns to 'hijack' programmes gained momentum, forcing WWE to effectively change its plans over a matter of weeks to appease its fanbase. But rewriting scripts is not a weapon F1 has at its disposal.

So when Bernie Ecclestone poses for a picture at the launch of the GPDA's own fan survey in Monaco, then months later declares "we should ask the fans what they want", you could understand if even F1's diehards will eventually feel like hijacking, or even worse, boycotting grands prix to express their dissatisfaction. Given the likelihood of the much-hyped 2017 rule changes ending up a disappointment, such a moment could be closer than most would like.

The lesson? Don't tell fans it's all about giving them what they want unless you really mean it.