It is true, the more people realize the potential in this market the more people and big names or big businesses will jump in. That's why those of us who can, need to act now and get all we can out of this while the window is open.

I am not saying the window is already closing, but we shouldn't wait and lose any opportunity that is sitting right in front of us.

healymedia I totally agree.

Keith

Plumbers are not IM people they don't care about Frank Kern! In the real biz world you can't just email hype and close a deal.

I'm sure he will get a bunch of telemarketers to try and close these deals so there is allot of work and headaches to come!

What does Frank Kern offer these plumbers that you can't offer? The brick and mortar biz owners don't take bull like we do here!! They might also run into some Frank Kern videos that I have seen that doesn't make him look very good with what he says!

yea, it may seem like this market is super saturated, but its not by a long shot. people dont realize that there are much more prospects offline than online.

I'm not going to lose any sleep over this. Even 100,000 Frank Kerns can't even begin to scratch the surface of the 'offline' part of the net.

Abdul.

If you've got a name locally, you're going to do better than anyone coming in.

Frank Kern is a big dog in the world of internet marketing. He's a pipsqueak in the world of traditional marketing consulting.

The #1 segment of business in this past year's Inc. 500 list was... marketing.

Don't get me wrong, Frank is a smart guy and transitioning his business base is probably a good idea for him. But the reality is that in the giant world of B2B marketing consulting, the entire marketplace is hundreds of billions annually. There's room for many multiple players in a single vertical. If Frank gets some massive percentage of the US market share of plumbers, say... 5-10%... giant 400 pound gorilla market share... that means he has 3-4K clients, and will be completely covered up for the rest of his life.

Delivering marketing services is very different than promoting digital products and shipping DVDs to people. It requires a real organization with real service delivery. That means a lot more limitation in the number of deals and amount of service that you provide.

A lot of people are figuring out that outsourcing your social media posts to some offshore VA is a hell of a lot different than actually managing a project delivery team that meets consistent benchmarks of service for an ongoing client.

It's not competition. It's validation that there's a massive market out there. But it will require a real business with real infrastruction and a real plan. If you think that you're going to sit back and do business with your monitor, you're going to be very disappointed in your career decision.

A lot of "offliners" are also going to quickly figure out that there's deeply entrenched, very experienced players that have existed for a long time, and will require a lot more than some shady pitch to land customers. Just because someone discovers the market for themselves doesn't mean that it hasn't been around for a very long time. It's not new. It's old, and there are a lot of serious players.

Watch out for Kern's $2000+ course on Offline Mass Control next year.

You really think he won't make one?

c'mon guys... who cares?

really.

is any of this gonna help you make more money?

The lesson here is to try sending offline sales letters to your customers and see if its profitable for you. (my guess is it could be).

Hey we have been doing offline marketing for years and there are bigger players than him who have come into the market over the years.

You can look at it as either a problem or an opportunity.

As a smaller operator you can offer more personalized services as these big players often offer less for more.

You can easily go in and offer more for less. They will provide you with the leads.

For example in Australia True Local is an offshute of one of the big newspaper conglomerates and provide us with a lot of great leads as we can provide a whole website and services for almost the same price they provide one listing.

Quentin

Brunson's at it too... Maybe they are going offline because they know there's a lot of money in it and they also realise that the IM crowd are getting a tad fed up with their games.

dotcomsecretslocal.com/go/

If Kern goes offline... Does this mean I will no longer be SPAMMED about Kern's product launches?

Here's my theory....

I don't think that Frank is really interested in selling marketing services to plumbers all over the country. He'll dabble in it just to build up a few good case studies but as far as a long term business focus I think he'd be bored stiff.

I also don't think Frank is doing this just to sell another $2k package to internet marketers. That's chump change to him and if he wanted to do it he would already have his package on the market.

My guess is that Frank and Jordan will be selling a consulting franchise opportunity to the millions of laid off business managers, executives and sales professionals. There are a lot of laid off business people who can't find a job and see self-employment as their best option. The market for consulting franchises is booming right now and it's very lucrative.

From around 2000 to 2006 a company called Y2Marketing sold a marketing consulting business opportunity (basically a franchise). Their target market....laid off business people. When someone signed up they were told to target....local business owners who needed to reengineer their marketing. Sound familiar?

Y2Marketing eventually self-destructed but not before selling roughly 1,400 franchises at $25,000 each. If my math is correct....that's $35,000,000. They also took between 10% and 30% of each consultants revenues as a royalty fee.

I suspect Frank and Jordan will follow a similar model and sell an Internet Marketing Consulting franchise. They'll run their new franchise owners through an bootcamp style training program and then certify them as "IM Experts". Of course they won't know squat because they will have never done it.

To pull this off they'll need to build a core team of people to deliver the technical aspects of the consulting work (websites, seo, etc). Then they'll sell the business opportunity to people saying "you sell it and manage the client relationship while our technical team delivers the results for you".

That's my theory....he's not going to sell a $2k package to us...he's going to sell a $25k (or higher) business opportunity package to a bigger market and then take a slice of all revenues.

Time will tell....

John

Kern can keep the Plumbers, I will stick with the small to large corporations that don't bat an eye paying $2,500 to $10,000 per month.

I bet he will have (insert creative name here) control 1st quarter of next year. He is working with Kevin Nations as well for offline and local marketing type stuff. I remember after mass control this rumor being started by him. I don't see him leaving anytime soon. He likes to promote scarcity with his man behind the curtain mystery tactics. He will be around trust me.

I opted in for his "Plumbers Money Free Report" and it's basically a classic 22 page Kern sales letter. Promises promises Frank, where's the "cool valuable stuff" you always preach?

I actually talked to Jim Garafolo (The Guy in the report) on the phone via a scheduled appointment with Kern's office. He works for Kern. He used to be a Ny stock broker back in the day. He now works in Kern's office on this project which is also tied to Kevin Nations.

My biggest question is with the scarcity. Make sure you call us before your region is taken. Are they just teaching Plumbers a info product on how to promote their business or a spot on some pre-designed web page that can get them local rankings.

I got the appointment by a direct mail to me with a dollar bill on it. I was curious and paid the 97 dollars for a 1 on 1 coaching appointment. Which the whole conversation was a pitch to pay more money for marketing to plumbers offline. I never really got any specifics on this.

The good thing is, by seeing the A/B test, we'll know which one wins

The first one has longer copy, while the second one is almost only a headline.

Wow --- i didnt have any idea who Kern was --- but now i do --- wow

hate to break it to ya... actually that squeeze is mine. :-)

Thanks Frank for this post! I'm glad you jumped in since this whole thread is about what you are doing.

It shows that you are human too. I first jumped in trying to sell chiropractors and I had no idea what to offer and what to charge and I failed. Nice to know I wasn't the only one to start off targeting a group of prospects with disappointing results!

It's funny, when pitching SEO to people, if you start talking about Danny Sullivan to anyone outside this space, they have no clue. We're just so hyper-funneled that we make a big deal about this type of stuff.

There are tons of marketing companies out there, all the way up to agencies like RazorFish that are competing for big marketing budgets and everyone in-between. Just because Frank Kern is jumping in, doesn't mean the "Sky is Falling" and we better get in while the getting is good. Just means the market will get better and the services will get better for clients.

Thanks Frank for actually swinging by and clarifying. It's a fun market and as I've always loved doing IM stuff, but I REALLY enjoy working with B2B/B2C clients. It's so fulfilling to help a business grow 50-100% (or more) from the work I did for them!

By the way there is a different "phrase" for SEO/IM. When using this one phrase correctly and at the right time, you'll have a B&M owner hanging on your every word.

Yes, he IS! He works out at my gym in Orange County... Newport Beach. We got good surf here buddy... 52nd street...check it out!

The B2B market is indeed massive. Gargantuan. Ginormous even.

There are also a lot of existing players already in the space that really, actually, truly do know what they're doing. They've also been doing it for a long time, and aren't just going to run away screaming like a school girl because an army of internet marketers, armed with the latest ebook WSO barge into the marketplace.

So a lot of the folks dreaming of the "offline space" beyond their cousin's dwindling DVD rental shop should be aware of the reality vs. hogging down the dreamsauce like it's a faerieland nirvana of untapped riches.

Frank, even you're already learning that it's a very different game. But you sound like you're up to the challenge - not to mention, able to come to the table with some resources and an organization.

I've been preaching this gospel for a very long time now.

There's a big gap between the picture painted with the intention of selling someone a how-to manual for becoming a marketing consultant (I know, I've bought a few WSOs... not offline gold... freaking comedy gold) and the reality of actually being in the market, doing exactly what everyone is talking about here for over 20 years.

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder how I keep from going under...

Sorry Frank, we're just trying steal as much of your stuff as possible. I should have known Frank Kern has a google alert set up for "Frank Kern". You're just getting some of us nervous with your crossover ventures. Don't worry, we won't go after your 100K Australian client. ;-)

Fun and jokes aside, based on this post alone, there are youngsters who aren't familiar with Frank Kern. Just let me say, Frank is the best in the business by far (that's why we follow him and rip him off as much as possible ;-).

Save your lunch money and buy "Mass Control". It is really the only course you will every need to become a world class successful Marketer. Frank let it all hang out in his teachings and the secrets to long term success are all clearly laid out in a step-by-step fashion.

Back to the Plumbers, as Frank indicated, the conversions weren't all that good.
When I think about plumbers and their business I don't see a high CLV. Think about it, how many times have you needed to call a plumber? There's also no continuity involved. I really don't believe plumbers are all that motivated to invest in their marketing as are not roofers. They want steady work but they really don't want to be inundated with customer backlog.

As Frank has pointed out in this thread, he just randomly decided to target plumbers as a marketing test, but I already knew that the conversions weren't going to be the greatest especially with higher priced IM services (i.e. $2000+ per month and up).

Unless this was a large plumbing services company with multiple branches, a small plumbing firm is most likely going to balk at a high priced continuity type service. Try to put yourself in their shoes - unless you could clearly justify your monthly fees to them in terms of ROI (not an easy task, in my opinion), I think you'd have a tough time selling them a $2000+ a month marketing service.

Whatever he ends up doing, I'm looking forward to hearing about Kern's offline adventures. Some of my colleagues have been enormously successful offline for over 10 years, and they know that there's always room for innovation.

There's a whole boatload of misinformation here. I've been in this business since the early 90's so I know this for a fact.

Be careful of what advice you take.

Frank Kern is not just an IMer. He is a marketer! He knows how to trigger peoples subconscious into making purchases. I also believe that Frank is targeting the offline community because of the boom of mobile marketing and the effect that offline video marketing is experiencing. Frank knows how to convert!

Kern goin offline is a mistake?

Did you guys forget about Joe Polish and Carpet Cleaners?

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The real asset that he has that many here don't is piles of cash. Now you can use your imagination from there as to what impact that has on building a high powered offline consulting business.
Couple that with his proven business acumen and ca-ching!

I heard that the Kern Offline thing fell apart, he wasn't happy with his partner. I am in San Diego, where he lives, word of mouth travels fast :-)

You most definitely have to make moves in internet marketing before it is too lat. However, that doesn't mean that there will not always be places to enter new markets. The strong and original will survive

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Guys, do u know that Franks offline business closed down?

You'd have to be a hell of alot bigger than Kern to tap out the offlline market lol.

This is really very important to remember. It is true, the more people realize the potential in this market the more people and big names or big businesses will jump in. That's why those of us who can, need to act now and get all we can out of this while the window is open.