Inside the Chicago Top 10 Contest: What Actually Gets You Called to the Stage

Ten names are about to get called out on a stage in Chicago, and somewhere around name eight or nine you notice a pattern. None of these people look like they had a head start. A team that spent one hard month scraping loose change out of a jar to cover groceries is up there next to a guy who got laid off from a corporate job the same week he was already clearing more than his old paycheck on the side. This session is nothing more than a countdown of the top ten affiliate contest winners, and it works because almost nobody called up there looks like the kind of person you’d expect to hear applauded in front of thousands.

If you’ve ever sat in a crowd like that, phone in hand, wondering whether your name will ever get called, this is the session built for exactly that itch.

Why does the ninth-place team matter more than the winner?

The Rushes take the stage at number nine, and before anyone hands them a trophy they tell the room what August of 2011 actually looked like for them: dumping every coin they could find around the house into the counting machine at the grocery store, taking the voucher to the register, and walking out with bread and lunch meat because that was what the change added up to. That’s the detail that lands harder than any of the numbers that come after it. Less than two years later they’re standing on a stage collecting a contest prize, and the same night, a man onstage right next to them casually mentions what he cleared the month before, a figure that would have covered a year of that kind of grocery run.

The gap between those two moments is the entire point of the session. Nobody up there started with money, a following, or a background in sales. They started broke, embarrassed, or stuck, and kept showing up anyway.

What’s actually being challenged when someone tells you to pay your dues?

Between names, the host takes a swing at an idea a lot of people in that room grew up believing: that success has to be earned slowly, dues paid over years, patience required before anyone gets in the door. He calls out the phrase people use for it directly, the promise of a long-term payoff that requires grinding for years before it shows up.

“It means take a long time to make no money at all.” That’s the reversal underneath the whole event. The contest winners standing up there aren’t proof that patience is a myth. They’re proof that the version of patience most people were sold, years of dues before any result, isn’t the only path available. One of the names called that night hadn’t been in the business three full weeks before taking first place, a detail the host makes sure the room sits with before moving on, precisely because it breaks the story people had accepted about how long this is supposed to take.

What happens when a team’s win becomes bigger than either person in it?

Third place goes to a couple, and when the mic reaches the woman half of that team, she doesn’t talk about numbers at all. She talks about standing on a stage at a previous event, announcing a goal out loud, and not actually believing she could hit it. What carried her, she tells the room, wasn’t her own confidence. It was the flood of messages, videos, and comments from people she’d never met in person, people asking her if she believed in herself when she clearly didn’t yet.

you guys have really stretched me a lot because when I stood up on stage last event and I said I was gonna do something I didn’t actually believe that I could do it and you guys sent me emails you sent me videos you sent me messages you sent me comments do you believe in you do you can do this so today it wasn’t Justin and I that won this he’s a great man I am powerful but it was you this is for you

That’s the part of the contest nobody puts on the trophy. A team can grind alone for a while, but what actually gets someone from doubting a goal they said out loud to standing on stage collecting it is usually a room full of strangers who decided to believe it before she did.

What do you actually do with all of this once the applause stops?

The spouses and partners who never get their own name called get a moment too, and the host stops the room mid-cheer to insist it isn’t enough, that the people supporting affiliates from the sidelines do more than anyone gives them credit for. Whether or not you’re standing next to someone doing that for you right now, it’s worth remembering who was in the room the night your name eventually gets called.

Here’s the actual lesson buried under the countdown, the chants, and the prize boxes: none of the ten names called that night got there by waiting for permission or by following a script that promised results only after years of dues. They got there by staying in the game through a rough month, telling their story honestly once someone handed them a mic, and letting a community they didn’t build alone carry them the rest of the way. Watch the full countdown and imagine, seriously, what it would feel like to hear your own name called next.

The full session goes further than what’s above, including every name called and every story behind it. Watch it in full, free, when you Create your free account.

The full session transcript follows below.

Transcript

Top five in the contest, get up here. I was supposed to keep you all on stage. Or excuse me, six through ten. Six through ten in the contest, get up here.

I don't know, I don't know, do we have a names list or something? Six through ten, six through ten, get up here on stage. Let's get these prizes out here, guys. Mike and Adam Whiting.

Hey, guys, who thinks that commission countdown thing is honestly the most badass thing ever? I just get, you know, you'd think after a while, you know, it might lose its lust, but it doesn't. It just never, ever, it just keeps getting better, guys. It just keeps getting better.

Six through ten, six through ten, up on stage, up on stage, six through ten. With a list. Anik, if Anik's partner's here, he can come up too. Let's get the prizes out here, guys, prizes out here.

Six through ten, who's six through ten? Do we got a list or something up there? What is it? One, two, three.

So we've got three out of the, Justin Gringio. And I feel like the guy at, you know, I feel like the guy who goes, let's get ready to rumble, Alex Zuby. All right, guys, let's get the prizes up here on a list. I think we've got, is this six through ten?

Laura Perry. Laura Perry? Give it up for the beautiful Dee Varengia. Would you?

The beautiful Jessica Rush. And the beautiful Melissa Santiago, I believe. Guys, let's just give it up for the spouses and the people who support us in our business. Let's give it up for them.

That's, stop, stop, stop, stop. That's not good enough. They do way too much. And even if they aren't supporting you right now, they will when you're up on stage.

So if you haven't made noise for them right now, make noise for them in the future. Guys, make some noise for our supporters. Okay, where's our prizes for number ten? Number ten.

We got prizes here going on? We can just hang out here on the stage. I have absolutely no problem just telling stories all night. Absolutely none.

Do I, Tony? What do you think about, do you got a mic? No, you don't. What do you think?

Yeah. What do you think about this so far? Well, it's really amazing. You smell pretty good, dude.

By the end of the night, I won't. That's for sure. So these are the cameras. Okay, so we, you know, I want to point something out to you guys real quick.

I made a small fortune before we started Empower off of a little flip cam, didn't I, honey? Erin, off of it. She's like, what? I made a small fortune with a little flip cam, didn't I, baby?

I'd be out. Now, here, I want you to think about this, too. When I first started shooting. I would, how many takes would I take, honey?

We'd be there all freaking night, right? You know? And now, now I just get in front of the camera and really don't give a damn, honestly, what it looks like, right? But even though you can make a small fortune with a flip cam, we wanted to get these guys badass cameras that probably do more than I even know what they do because I usually just press on and it goes on and then I press off and that's just it.

You know, so I don't know how to do the setting. So who is number 10? Do we know who number 10 was? You guys?

Guys, make some noise. Appreciate you guys. Appreciate you guys. Thank you, David.

Appreciate you, honey. Appreciate you. Want to say something about Alex here real quick. And I don't know, can we, do we have any mics?

Do you have any mics? We've got a couple over here. So he doesn't have to talk into my armpit? He probably doesn't mind, but do you, Alex?

You don't mind talking into the armpit. So just how, like… Many days ago, did you lose your job or get fired or finally get laid off after you made like hundreds of thousands of dollars online? Funny thing is, funny thing is it happened this week.

Happened this week, right? This guy has been making, he's been crushing it online, right? And just didn't, didn't quit his job for whatever reason. Right?

And now he's here picking up a camera because he probably made another hundred thousand dollars in the last six seconds. And they finally fired his butt, right? It's like Lawrence Tam who was sitting in, you know, the cubicle making, you know, 40,000 a month and just wouldn't quit because it was a cush job, right? Lawrence had a cush job, he said.

Another guy, right? Built his business, hundreds of thousands of dollars in commissions, part-time, right? Part-time. Congratulations, brother.

Thanks, man. Yeah. Number nine. Now, everybody's getting the camera.

So what I want to just do is just kind of… I've recognized everybody. They come in these boxes, you know, badass rebel camera, something to say. And they're also getting a bunch of, a whole lot of gear that goes with these cameras that we're just not carrying out here.

So there's a big-ass box in the back with a bunch of other shit in it that we need to see. Hey, Jerry's not getting off stage without us doing the Jerry chant. Jerry, Jerry, Jerry, Jerry, Jerry. Hey, real quick.

I want to say something about Alex. That I think's funny, okay? And we're doing this for a reason. We want to give you guys a new perspective on everything.

The other day, you know, I was like, are you still working that stupid job? Because I couldn't get him to quit. You know what I'm saying? He's making like $30,000 a month.

I'm like, how much is your job? He's like, well, you know, like $6,000 or $8,000 or something. I can't remember what it was. I was like, why are you keeping that stupid thing?

It's taking your whole day off. You can do fun stuff in the day. And he was worried about going… Check this out.

He was worried about going full-time because he… What did you say? You're Ukrainian or something? Is that what you…

Hold on, hold on. You said you're… Can you just repeat what you told me? He's afraid…

He was nervous to go full-time. Why? Because you're afraid people can't understand you? Honestly, I can't even remember.

I was just making woosie excuses. He could have said something, but… So my point is that he's afraid people wouldn't understand him, and he's making $30,000 a month, and he still is nervous about quitting his job. I just thought that was awesome.

You guys are awesome. If I can do this… Anyone can do this. That's my point.

I'm good. Sorry. Back over to you. Oh, what were we doing?

I forgot. I can't remember. I started thinking about Alex and his… No, number nine.

Right, number nine. Who is that? The Rushes. Make some noise for them.

Any particular thing you want to say? Oh, God. That scared me. Yeah, I know.

It's scary. No, it's just so awesome. What? 18 months ago…

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. We grabbed the change drawer, the change jar off the top of our chest of drawers and took it to the grocery store. And you know the machine at the front of the store where you dump all your change in it and it gives you the little voucher?

Yeah, so I had to dump all that in there. I got an $80 voucher, took that to customer service. They got me $80 and went around the store and got loaf of bread, meal, sandwich meat. That was probably about it.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We had to buy groceries with what change we could scrape up around the house.

That was probably August of 2011. Wow. What did you make last month, Tony? $142,000.

That's all you're saying. You're done. You're done. That's all you're saying.

Who is number eight? All right. Bam crew. Get them a camera.

Get them a camera. You're awesome, dude. I've known Mike for years. Bam crew.

Get them a camera. Mike's awesome. I met you, what, three years ago? Yeah.

Three years ago when you contacted me because I took your PowerPoint. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That was nice. I didn't even remember that until he told me the other day. I was like, hey, dude, that's my, like, you just took my slides and, like, put your voice over my voice. He was doing, he was modeling, yeah.

He even made himself sound a little squealy. He's like, hi, I'm Mike. I live in Costa Rica. And, no.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

Oh, so hilarious. Thanks, man. You guys are great. .

That was awesome. arel. Cool. You get some power, yeah.

Ready, go. My nickname for Michael is awesome. That's my nickname, man, so, I'll just say it. That's what I wanted to say so I'll just leave it at that.

Or, I'll take a look at the timeline. Didn't leave it. That's what I want to do. There you go,判 number six are we on six seven sorry keep forgetting you guys are all together oh a nick is his partner here yeah yeah we'll come back to him number five oh six troy troy and melissa troy and melissa make some noise for him anything you know most people don't know but troy can actually levitate yeah no it's funny uh just being on stage in front of thousands of people because seven years ago i thought the only way that would ever happen if i was just you know shooting jump shots from the corner or something like that but this is uh this is a great moment for us we worked hard for this uh glad to be amongst the crowd here and the leadership here and just all of you people that's why we do it and we're looking forward to the future i said this on the empower our call i feel like the empower was built in the now with the future in mind at all times and just like we said this is a freckle on a pimp or a pimple on a freckle and that's a nat's ass excuse me i i was trying to nail that i didn't know if i get it but we appreciate this we appreciate empower network and we're glad to be here we're going to be around for a long time so number five nobody but justin and d varengia oh he's number three do they oh is that are they six no three oh they're three three three who's five oh michelangelo michelangelo he didn't even know he won he's back there come on up brother he's not used to it six through ten right laura right right right right right hey make some noise for this guy he was just back in the crowd hey congratulations yeah glad you're here you're right brother anything you want to say appreciate you you know i've been online for seven years and about five months ago a friend says hey you gotta listen to this hippie guy man he's good so i said man i'm not gonna listen to him because you don't need to like his look you just need to like make money so i went in the back office and i'm like wow that was awesome the training i'm speaking of and ever since one last thing i have to say is this i don't promote anything but empower network because i believe in putting all your eggs in one basket and watching them grow proud of you brother give him a hand everybody how much are we giving him by the way i don't is this two thousand dollars twenty five hundred bucks guys cool it's awesome guys give him a hand give him a hand hey thanks come on thanks for coming hey proud of you brother who's number four four laura hey who thought she gave a good first speech ever proud of you any additional words for your victory uh well this first let me say this girl dominated for like two months i'm killing it right everybody's just in awe of what she's doing so just for that that's all i want to say about you make some noise just for her just dominating thank you it's just uh it's proof of the power of belief that's that's really all i gotta say about that but before the commission countdown i got a message on my phone that i got another master cell so i just hit eighty thousand dollars well you just got five thousand more oh and i got five thousand more eighty five thousand eighty five thousand dollars in the power network make some noise for you guys come on make some noise for hey congrats congratulations that's proof that's proof that six months change happens quickly right it doesn't happen slowly it happens quickly success happens quickly it happens when did you join when did she join i don't know but she was laura laura when did you join may 24th may 24th so this was the early release of you know the i'm getting out of tao now i just really feel left out and grateful for you guys being uh we've been right the way you are until the first time so please let us know if you have any questions about anything else something to add or if you have any technical range before i'll let you know yeah sorry if i can't make a call just notice you guys are as big fans and social media as you're something else we i don't mean just to say i found something small ever done anything to subscribers first did you go to the first event have you been to everything no my first event san diego so first event was san diego how much have you had you made it's Wed 얘 um common did you go to the first event have you been to everything skincare number three come on boom wow I want to just thank every single person in here you guys have really stretched me a lot because when I stood up on stage last event and I said I was gonna do something I didn't actually believe that I could do it and you guys sent me emails you sent me videos you sent me messages you sent me comments do you believe in you do you can do this so today it wasn't Justin and I that won this he's a great man I am powerful but it was you this is for you thank you yeah I think sometimes we just need to be reminded of how great and special and powerful we are truly are and when we form together a mastermind like here we can change the world so I just want to say I appreciate you and I believe in you and anything you set your mind to I know you can do it cuz we did it they all did it and we love doing it you know I mean no no hidden meaning there no there is no double entendres there number two number two Big Mac!

You in the house? You in the house, bro? No? I'm sure you will.

You'll take it. All right, we'll get it to him somehow, someway. I know he's here. I just, he's not here, here.

Number one, now hold on a second now. Number two was, I think, 10,000. 10,000, right? Yeah.

So, hey guys, I want to, before we bring up number one, I want to just, I want to just remind you guys of what can happen in an instant, right? A lot of you think that you've got to, Tony, pay your dues. Tony, how many times have you heard that, brother? You just get sick and tired of hearing that bullshit, right?

You get sick and tired of hearing people tell you that you can't live your dreams fast. Yeah. You've got to earn the, what were you saying in the, in the, in the leaders meeting, the long-term. Oh, the, the, the long-term residual.

Long-term. I'm starting to forget the, the phrase. Yeah. Yeah.

It means take a long time to make no money at all. Right. Hey, how many, how many people have sold that dream and lived that nightmare before? Huh?

So guys, Vic comes in and not only makes $700,000 in like, actually, 21 days. I don't think it was even eight seconds nor six seconds. I actually think it was four seconds. Yeah.

Now, so brother, then he comes in and he sweeps number one place in the contest. And it was a fight, right? All you guys killed it. Everybody did a good job.

Everybody who placed in the top 200, everybody who made an effort to place at all. I love you. I appreciate you. I respect your effort, but let's celebrate number one right now.

Come on out, brother. And everybody, come on. Celebrate success. What's that?

30, 35,000. What is it? 35, Jerry? 35, 35,000.

Man, it's kind of cool to get 35,000 for what? For nothing, right? For nothing. Yeah.

But I just want to say, guys, this is, you know, I'm not, I mean, making money is great, you know, but I mean, 35,000 is cool and everything, but this money is actually belongs to, not to me, this belongs to my team. You know what we're going to do with that? We're going to put this back into our team and just do some advertising with it, you know, because my, my, see, my thing is I want to empower my team. And so that's what's going to happen when you, you know, when you get to a certain level in your income, and then it becomes more than about the money thing.

It becomes more about, you know, helping somebody out on your team and helping them become more successful. So this money goes back to Big Idea Mastermind. You guys earned it, so it's yours. Hold it up, brother.

Hold it up. There it is, guys. There it is. Hey, guys, again, I want to congratulate every single one of you.

I'm going to do it again. I'm going to do it again. I'm going to congratulate every single one of you who made an effort, who did something, who stretched a little bit in the contest. And I want you guys to look forward to another badass contest because at Empower Network, we just don't sleep, right?

We're not complacent. We don't think success that what we've earned up until this point is okay. There's always more. And guys, I love you.

I appreciate you. You rock. Let's make one last more round of applause for all of the winners. Come on, guys, stand up.

Hold on a second, brother. Give him a hand. We celebrate success. Give him a hand.

Congratulations. Folks, obviously, the income examples discussed in this video are extraordinary. The income claims presented are not intended to serve as a guarantee of income. Instead, they're designed to give you an idea of what's possible.

Success in this business requires leadership, hard work, and dedication. Since we want to help you make an informed decision, we've gone above and beyond with our income disclosure document. If you want to see the average earnings, please visit the page at www.empowernetwork.com. www.empowernetwork.com.php