Vote for Yayra Nego: Miss Universe

The beautiful delegates from all over the world have gathered in Sao Paolo, Brazil in preparation towards the 2011 Miss Universe beauty contest and right in the thick of it is Ghana’s Yayra Nego who is getting rave reviews from bloggers and pageant analysts. The public can vote for her to improve her chances as for the first time ever, the Miss Universe Organization will offer a fan vote and an on-screen interactive technology to increase fan engagement worldwide during the finale. <<VOTE NOW>>>

The pageant will air LIVE from Sao Paulo, Brazil on Monday, September 12 at 9 p.m. ET on NBC. A pre-pageant fan vote built by CommerceTel has been launched that will grant one of the 89 contestants automatic advancement to the semifinals, which will be announced during the LIVE telecast. On the night of the show, the iPowow "In The Now" technology will enable the home audience to 'gamify' their viewing experience by voting in real-time for their favorite contestant during the live telecast.

"CommerceTEL and IPOWOW technologies are two ways that we are incorporating our fans into our show and having them play an active role in the competition," says Colin Hornett, Director of Digital Multimedia at the Miss Universe Organization. "We are constantly searching for new ways to involve our fans, and hope that we can continue to be at the forefront of fan engagement with our incredible global reach of approximately 1 billion followers from all over the world during the Miss Universe competition."

Fans can vote online at www.missuniverse.com or www.NBC.com through Sunday, September 11, 2011 at 6 p.m. ET. Fans may rank the contestants a total of 10 times per day. The contestant with the highest average score will advance to the semifinals.