During the hectic last month that was April, we got a moment to chat with the man behind the pay per view platform GoFightLive or GFL David Klarman. On their site, GFL.TV, fans can have a chance to see regional and international combat sports events from across the globe. This is a fantastic outlet for promotions looking to create a worldwide buzz. Events range in price and believe us when we say they definitely have an array of quality programming for any fight fan.
Our first foray into GFL was the recap that was done for the all-women’s pro boxing event Nordic Coliseum Women’s Boxing. From Muay Thai to Pro Wrestling you can find a full platform of events at your leisure on GFL for a great price. Here are a couple great things that GFL has to offer. There are 24,000 fighters in the GFL database, with each fighter having their own fighter page. There are over 16,000 fights with 10,000 hours of programming. Currently the site had 250,000 active users and 63,000 Facebook fans. Enjoy your interview with David and be on the lookout for your favorite promotion on Go Fight Live!
David thanks for taking the time to speak with me how’s things going over at Go Fight Live and are you excited for your spring and summer schedule?
Things at GFL are going great. We have been securing new clients every month across various genres of combat sports, including MMA, Pro Boxing, Muay Thai, Kickboxing, Grappling, Pro Wrestling and Lucha Libre. MMA is our biggest piece of business, but we also have the most robust mix of properties in GFL’s seven-year history. Next week, for example, we have 10 live events from 9 cities and as far away as Australia, including 7 MMA, 2 Muay Thai, 1 boxing and 1 pro wrestling.
We have an exciting lineup of programming set for the spring and summer and are still adding events to the schedule. Some of these events will be offered on both live IP/Wireless based platforms as well as on our weekly 2-hour television series on Comcast SportsNet via tape delay. To date we have air 135 continuous weeks on CSN.
We have also begun a few new initiatives to offer news coverage of the properties we cover, to fight fans. The fact is that many of these properties are filled with future world champions, exciting and dynamic athletes and people who have incredible achievements under their belt outside of prize fighting, and it’s up to us to tell their stories and showcase what is going on at these events with original video and editorial content that GFL has the ability to deliver because of its presence at these events. Be on the lookout for daily updates to the news feed on our homepage.
GFL is a great idea for smaller promotions and international ones to be seen by a larger audience where did the original idea come from to start the network?
In 2007 I launched GFL with my partner Jerry Palmer and we believed that digital distribution, or ing of video would be the next big innovation to the manner in which content is distributed. We witnessed the launch of YouTube in 2005, and decided that live ing of video was the way to start. We felt, unlike the Us and Lives, that a vertical approach would be the best alternative. We looked at the different types of content and decided that sports was the best choice because of the demand of consumers to watch sports on a live basis. We looked at the market place and history and found that combat sports - mainly boxing - have historically been a leader when it comes to the launch of new distribution platforms. From the birth of television in the 1950’s, to the emergence of closed circuit in the 1970’s, to the launch of cable TV in the 1980’s and to the rise of pay-per-view in the 1990’s, boxing has been a leader. Thus, we felt that if we followed suit by offering live combat sports , we would be ahead of the marketplace.
Now we have been on your site many times to see all sorts of combat sports but we’re curious to which one you are a fan of and how long have you been invested in that sport?
Honestly, when I first got into the business, I wasn’t passionate about combat sports. By no means was I turned off by these sports, but I just wasn’t as enthusiastic as many fight fans are about the combat sports that they love. My feelings changed as I became more immersed in the business and as I started going to some of the live events that we were producing as well as distributing. The level of energy at these events, the athleticism of some of these athletes and the fast pace of the bouts really got my blood flowing, and I have been a fan ever since.
At this point, I am not really partial to any one form of combat as I am too exciting fights. If the intensity and excitement are there, I am a fan.
So if we are a regional promotion for mixed martial arts and we want our product on your channel what’s the process and is it the same for boxing or pro wrestling?
The process is relatively simple and is the same across all forms of combat sports events. If a promoter is already producing video of a live event, we just require that the venue have a minimum internet upload speed and that the producer is able to use our software and plug in to a laptop computer on-site.
We have live technical support for video producers in order to make the process of ing easy and we monitor the so, if there is an issue, we can communicate with the CDN (content delivery network) and help troubleshoot the issues for the teams on site. This is not a service that other ing companies provide.
Our system is also very intuitive. A user is asked to check his or her bandwidth on an event page before purchasing a fight, just to make sure the user’s machine is connected to the internet and that the download speed is sufficient to view the show. In addition, we have live customer support, so if a user is having an issue, there is someone to communicate with, and who can go into the system and see what issues exist, and hopefully resolve it. If we cannot resolve it, we can at least initiate a refund.
GFL has an incredible production team that allows us to offer promoters top notched, TV broadcast quality video production services at an affordable price point if the promoter does not have video production in place for an event. It is always in the promoter’s best interest to produce video of a show and build a video library of events, so that they have footage of their fighters for future media use. We have produced shows for CSN, SNY, FSN and other networks. We have broadcast live to InDemand for live pay per view events.
The first thing we’ve ordered from GFL is the Nordic Coliseum Women's Boxing event. We are curious if there is a way a fighter could keep a copy of the or would they have to order it each time?
Our video s cannot be saved to a computer, but footage of a fighter’s bout can certainly be made available to that fighter via download. This is not our preference, though. GFL was founded on the premise that, if we provide a front end for viewers, they can watch any fight live or VOD from any place and any device, making DVD unnecessary. Currently our model allows a viewer to pay one time and watch whenever and wherever they are.
Now we noticed before there were podcasts and pro wrestling talk shows on there. What’s the process for someone to have a show on your network if still available?
Great question. If a producer of a show or a journalist is interested in distributing a web TV , radio or podcast program on the GFL platform, he or she should reach out to us through the “Contact Us” form on GFL.tv, and provide sample programming for consideration. We are always looking for innovative and engaging content with a fresh take on combat sports, and we have a tremendous, far-reaching global platform that can help talent build their brands and make names for themselves.
Is it up to you or the promotion to come up with the intro videos and how are so many feeds sent to GFL each weekend?
Combat sports has a global reach. The biggest challenge has been the time difference. It makes sense for them to be on GFL for several reasons (i) We have a large user base in North America (US and Canada), making GFL a great marketing play for promoters and fighters globally. No matter which combat sport you are looking to make a name for yourself in, the US market is an important one and we can deliver that market to you both digitally and through Cable/Satellite, (ii) This year alone, we have served pay-per-view consumers from 199 countries, so we know that GFL is reaching a massive geographic audience and (iii) Our marketing efforts focus on generating coverage from the largest global news platforms for general and combat sports, as well as social media promotion via Facebook, Twitter and other top social media platforms.
Promoters focus on selling tickets in order to be successful. GFL complements the promoters’ efforts by assisting them in reaching a much larger audience. While they focus on marketing to a fan base within a 50+ mile radius of a live event location, we have the ability to showcase their products to a global audience. This is important on many levels: (i) Brand awareness is key to longevity (ii) Access to top fighters is also key, and giving fighters a platform that enables them to be seen live and through many different mediums (IP, IPTV, mobile devices, Cable TV, etc.) encourages them to work with those promoters who give them the best chance of becoming a world champion in their sport and (iii) GFL makes it easy for promoters to accomplish all the things that do not fall into their wheelhouses. We (a) produce and manage their video (ii) market their shows to fans worldwide and (iii) deliver video live and on demand to combat sports fans.
As a person who deals with the combat industry do you have any quick thoughts on what happened with the UFC light heavyweight Champion and how a negative light like that can be damaging to combat sports and outlets such as GFL?
The situation with Jon Jones was tragic on a number of levels. It looks like the guy was leading a self-destructive lifestyle even though his performances in the UFC cage are consistently phenomenal. What fighters need to realize is, whether they like it or not, they are role models for young fans who admire and look up to them. Given the position that they are in, they need to assume responsibility for their actions. I hope that he gets the help and support he needs from those around him. As far as his actions damaging the reputation of combat sports, I don’t think his behavior or actions are in any way unique to combat sports. Unfortunately, we have been seeing similar kinds of destructive behavior from athletes in other sports, like football and basketball. It’s a shame and it needs to change.
Head over to GFL.TV for their upcoming schedule of events and we would like to thank David once again for his time.