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It would be hard to spend any time at all in the internet marketing community without hearing Frank Kern’s name mentioned. He’s branded himself very effectively, and has become not just a name, but a legend in internet marketing. Some even call him the “Blond Jesus Of Internet Marketing” ( or maybe it’s just me that calls him that – but I digress.)

Frank Kern was formerly an investment banker working for “Corporate America”. He was “successful” in that endeavor, but quickly became burned out on the 9 to 5 rat-race, “guilded cage” scenario that his life had become. He knew there was more to life than long hours, office politics, and having to answer to others, and thus began an affiliate marketing business out of his basement in Macon, Georgia.

Frank’s first Internet marketing home run was in the “dog training” niche. His alias or pen name in that market was Dean Rankin. He developed ebook courses on the subject of “how to train your dog” and built that up to a multi-million dollar per year business, and sold it off at the height of it’s success (a strategy well worth noting BTW.)

From there, the Frank Kern empire began to plant it’s roots in the Internet Marketing and Make Money Online niches.This is when things really start to get interesting. The debut of Mass Control was a highly successful product launch, and a prime example of concepts taught by Frank’s guru colleague, co-hort, and reigning king of the product launch himself, Jeff Walker.

It would probably be a disservice and injustice to write up Frank Kern’s bio and not mention his guru cousin Trey Smith, although he’ll eventually get his very own guru bio page here at Successopedia.org .

One of Kern’s side projects is Info Millionaire, which was co-created and co-operated by good ol Cousin Trey. Trey is a highly successful (and entertaining) marketer in his own right, however his role in this Kern/Smith IM dynamic duo has been relegated to that of “sidekick”. But to keep things in perspective here, this sidekick’s self-made Internet marketing income and net worth is to be envied. Last I heard, it was in the hundreds of thousands per year (and I am sure by now it has far exceeded that.)

As time marched on, the Mass Control phenomenon saw it’s evolution played out in the form of a sub-sequent and even more successful release Mass Control 2.0 (MC2) and then again when Frank launched List Control. The quality and production values of Frank Kern’s free training material and videos were highly apparent, and for many in the online marketing community, began to establish a “hero worship” like fascination, infatuation, obsession among lesser marketers.

A notable example of this might be Frank’s “Mysterious Stranger” video. In this free pre-launch video, accessible only after opting into one of Frank’s sub-lists, Frank describes the process of building repoire with your prospects in a given niche market. In order to illustrate his point, he uses the analogy a “mysterious stranger” and in many ways, he simultaneously takes on that role himself within the video (and in other videos within the particular series of videos and pre-launch content from which this video originated.)

Frank plays the proverbial cowboy (and his slight southern drawl certainly helps with that) riding out into the sunset – not on a horse, but in his bad ass classic VW van. Surrounded not by the desert landscape of the old west, but rather the exclusive coastal community and well known surf town of La Jolla, California.

Complete with aged film effects and sepia tone filters, this and the other videos in this series took on an almost “other worldly” undertone, and Frank successfully imbued himself with the etheric quality of a quiet, confident hero whose skills, abilities, and authority in the realm of internet marketing somehow blurred the line between success and flat out primordial, archtypal hero of legendary proportions (often and aptly compared – perhaps only by me – to what Bruce Lee did with his status in the Martial Arts and Film-making.)

Man, or myth? Immortal prophet and Savior? The Blond Jesus of IM incarnate? Could this even possibly be just another savvy Internet marketer whose mastered the art of the product launch – or was there something transcendent happening here? For many of Kern’s followers, these were the natural questions to ask (or maybe just me, but whatever.)

Shortly after the end of Kern’s List Control launch, his blog briefly displayed what looked like an error messege in simple .txt format, with a very simple message:

“Frank Kern Has Retired From Teaching Internet Marketing And Now Only Accepts Private Clients And Platinum Members…”

And with that simple message, overnight, a wave of shock and awe (see video below) and  some would say all out mayhem and mob lunacy, broke out in villages the world over.  Wales of despair and mourning were heard rising from crowds of Internet marketers – at the local marketplaces, at the temples and places of worship, and even among the oracles of Delphi – the gossip spread throughout all facets of life and across all the lands and continents of the Earth: “Frank Kern is Retiring from Internet Marketing!” they gasped, in agony.

This simple message could have been the most life changing event ever experienced by the inhabitants of Frank’s enormous, religious following (i.e. subscriber list.) “What will we do with our evenings?” they asked themselves, trying to make sense of the heart wrenching news.

But much to the marketing world’s delight – soon after this dark period of history (lasting a couple of days)  his blog reappeared, featuring in fact a well crafted blog post promoting an affiliate offer – for none other than a “local business marketing” premium product, priced in the $2000 range.

Sighs of relief rang out across the land and once again peace returned to the Earth. “Frank’s Back! – Behold, as surely as the sun doth rise, Frank Kern was, is, and forever shall be, an internet marketer!”  the legions of his followers rejoiced – and in fact, Frank never left at all.

The whole sordid affair turned out to be just another “good ‘ol fashioned scarcity play” (to quote a favorite expression of Kern’s) intended to build anticipation for what was likely a highly profitable JV affiliate marketing campaign.

Frank Kern will undoubtedly continue to mystify, amaze, and drive insanely large amounts of traffic, conversions, and sales. Perhaps more importantly, he will likely continue to inspire otherworldly levels of excellence and success in Internet marketing.