Well, almost did it…

These last few days of voting frankly, stunned the entire industry multiple times.

Just when it seemed like Ray Higdon‘s lead was going to stick and everyone was going to eat his dust… things change dramatically…

After a week or so of feverish voting, Dean Kosage‘s organization gets wind that he had been nominated to speak at No Excuses Summit 3 and the news goes viral within his massive international downline and his votes on Google +1 and Facebook “Likes” sky rocket past everyone, leading all of us to believe that he was going to run away with it and there was no one to catch him. (Bear in mind that all this happened without Dean even realizing it, as he confessed to us during a private phone conversation later).

Then a few days later, non-guru Geoff Stephen‘s nomination is received and as soon as his profile and pic is posted, his downline take notice and he rockets right past Ray Higdon and was right on Dean Kosage’s tail. (Geoff benefits from having a downline of 100,000+ distributors who love him so for those who know him, his rise was no surprise, but everyone else was asking, “Do you say his name like ‘Jeff’? Who is this dude?”

For another week, the race in the top 3 pretty much settles with Dean at #1, Geoff at #2 and Higdon at #3, leaving everyone else to fight for spots #4 through #10.

A Real Life Rocky Story

Then just this past weekend, master closer and HUGE underdog, Cesar Rodriguez, makes a play to see how far he can go given he only has an small but loyal ActivityTracker.com email list of 6,000, yet still determined to prove himself worthy of the No Excuses 3 stage. His friends and list members got him some votes, but realizing he’s going to need some more firepower to break through the top 10, just like a politician, starts working the phones, meeting with people, IM’ing friends on Facebook, offers bonuses and even recruits other internet marketers and list owners to mail for him and tell their people to votes. He creates a marketing campaign bribing his followers to not just vote for him, but to get their friends to vote for him too.

Within 3 days, Cesar (now nicknamed, Rocky Balboa) rockets to #4 right on Ray Higdon’s tail. With Dean (Apollo Creed) and Geoff (Ivan Drago, the Russian), comfortably at the top, Cesar was about to get comfortable and settle in #4 place per the pleadings of his wife Adrian. (Why is she always trying to bring the dude down?!?)

However after being influenced by some Jedi Mind tricks from Ferny (I called him a wuss), he set his sights on beating Ray Higdon (Mr. T) and put his viral campaign into overdrive.

Simultaneously, Tracey Walker, Greg Gomez, Adam Holland, Brenda Gagne, Kevin and Darin Blue teamed up on the final night for a “Earn Your Vote!” live webinar where they collectively provided tons of free training for their list members to rally up some votes their way. WIN WIN for all!

Cesar’s viral campaign works better than expected and pretty soon not only does he blow past Mr. T but is now pushing up against Geoff.

Now we have the classic David and Goliath battle. Rocky (Cesar) vs Ivan Drago (Geoff).

Geoff, the Russian, was at home having dinner with his family (and probably taking steroids and working out like in the movie) not really paying attention to anything until he receives a friendly text from Ferny reading, “Dude! Cesar just passed you up in votes! He’s kicking your ass!”

Geoff replies, “Is he?? Damn. Will try with my “unincentivised” votes.” (Of course he said all this in Russian, just like the evil Ivan Drago.)

The Russian had yet to email his list, but with Dean (Apollo) way ahead and Cesar having just gone into second place, Geoff unleashed the beast and let out the full power of his downline email list! (He decided against emailing the million plus lead list for fear of crashing our servers. Thanks, Geoff!)

With the click of a mouse and with 3 hours left in the contest, his people start voting like gangbusters taking him from 500+ votes to over 900+ votes in just a few hours!

Not only did he crush the tenacious Rocky Balboa (Cesar Rodriguez), but blew right past Dean Kosage (Apollo Creed) for the #1 spot in the contest.

(It should be noted that Dean Kosage a.k.a Apollo Creed never emailed anyone nor campaigned. It was all his downline supporting their mentor, organically.)

It was a dramatic finish with multiple server crashes from all the viral traffic this campaign produced and the shenanigans of a few Chinese hackers trying to jam our servers. (Bastards!)

With voting over, the Cinderella ‘Rocky’ story of Cesar Rodriguez didn’t quite end like Rocky IV ended. This time, Ivan Drago (Geoff Stephen), crushes Rocky’s hopes and dreams, (and Adrian probably ends up leaving him for a real winner, like Mr. T).

Final Results

Total Votes:
Geoff Stephen
Dean Kosage
Cesar Rodriguez
Ray Higdon
Diane Hochman
Tracey Walker
Greg Gomez III
Brian & Rhonda Swan
Kevin & Darin Blue
Pamela Herrmann

Facebook ‘Likes’ Only:
Geoff Stephen
Cesar Rodriguez
Dean Kosage
Ray Higdon
Cheri Tree
Diane Hochman
Pamela Herrmann
Greg Gomez III
Tracey Walker
Brian & Rhonda Swan

So now that the movie credits are rolling and the Rocky chants have settled, today Ray, Ferny and our panel of leaders begins the vetting process.

In all seriousness, everyone in the top 20 have earned themselves serious consideration to speak, but must stand against the scrutiny of our panel (who’s identities we’ll reveal after speakers are announced).

Things we’ll be weighing include:

• Voting Results (obviously)
• Marketing Prowess (gotta sell some tickets!)
• Past JV Support for NES (want givers, not just takers)
• Past NES attendance
• Annual Income from Home Business (~$200k/year or more requirement)
• Reputation (if there is dirt, we’ll dig it up)
• Among other things…

This voting process has allowed us to connect with amazing leaders who have flown under the radar for many years. In fact, the top 3 guys are all new to our No Excuses Summit community.

We are also grateful for the support you showed many of our longstanding leaders such as Ray Higdon, Diane Hochman, and Tracey Walker. And grateful for our new relationships with serious leaders like Brian and Rhonda Swan, Greg Gomez III and Pamela Herrmann.

Without your votes, these and many others awesome leaders would not be on our radar, even with the hundreds of thousands of lives they are impacting. (It’s hard to know everyone.)

We’ll be announcing the speakers for No Excuses Summit 3 next week.

Until then, be on the look out for an email later tomorrow with announcements on the No Excuses 3 launch dates, how to sign up as an affiliate and much more. We are just getting started. (For the basics, click here)

Talk soon!
Ferny and Ray