Known by many as the Michael Jordan of internet marketing (at least that’s how he markets himself), Mike Filsaime, is the OG when it comes to affiliate and digital marketing.
Born to Haitian immigrants in the United States, Mike Filsaime could be considered as one of the exemplary entrepreneurs and internet marketers who is living the American dream.
Going from a college drop-out to becoming one of the founding fathers of internet marketing, Mike Filsaime has revolutionized the way sales and marketing is done!
Mike Filsaime’s Quick Recap
- Mike Filsaime is the OG of affiliate marketing, dubbed the Michael Jordan of internet marketing.
- Born on October 26, 1967 in Long Island to Haitian immigrants.
- At 17, he coded and sold a lottery-ticket checker for $25,000.
- Spent 16 years as a top sales manager at his family’s car dealership.
- Launched Carbon Copy Marketing, Butterfly Marketing, The 7 Figure Code, and PayDotCom.
- Co-founded WebinarJam (2013), Kartra (2018), and GrooveFunnels (2019) with over 1 million users.
- Has generated $175 million+ in revenue, serves 250,000+ customers and 3 million subscribers.
Who is Mike Filsaime?
If you’ve heard about or used WebinarJam, Kartra, Groove etc, then it’s time to get acquainted with Mike Filsaime.
Mike Filsaime may not be the most well-known digital marketers/entrepreneurs out in the spotlight today in 2026, but he developed some of the digital marketing software and tools millions of business owners use worldwide.
In addition to his role as a software developed, Mike is also an author, speaker, and CEO of a few companies.
Most notably, Butterfly Marketing, a few webinar platforms, and Groove Digital which rivals sales funnels softwares like ClickFunnels by Russell Brunson.
Mike Filsaime has a track record of generating over $175 million in revenue and sales, and is well respected within his field often being invited as a guest speaker for major marketing conferences and events.
According to his personal accounts, he has over 250,000 loyal customers, 3 million lifetime subscribers, and collectively generated over $175,000,000 for enterprises and businesses.
Mike Filsaime Childhood
Mike Filsaime was born in Long Island, New York on October 26, 1967 to Haitian immigrants.
His parents came from humble backgrounds, but through hard-work, they were able to live the American dream and guide Mike towards his future path.
Mike’s father worked as a life insurance and car salesman before owning his own dealership, which greatly impacted Mike’s future as his dad often mentored him through example.
From a young age, Mike learned the importance of hard work, entrepreneurship, persistence, and self-belief.
According to Mike Filsaime’s words
“My dad was born in Haiti, so was my mother. My dad came here in 1959. He had to register for the military to get into the country. He became a life insurance salesman, car salesman, manager and then bought his own dealership. My dad always brought me up to tell me that I could be anything I was. He never told me I was better than anybody but always gave me this mindset. I believe that my dad, being such an entrepreneur and the way that I was raised always saw everything as an opportunity.”
his father had a huge impact during his childhood years. Source: https://mitchrusso.com/
When Mike was 16, he got a Commodore 64, one of the earliest computers, and taught himself how to code.
When he was just 17, Mike built a lottery ticket checking software and sold it for $25,000 (~$72,000 adjusted for 2026 inflation) to Lottery Players Magazine, which laid the foundation for his entrepreneurial and software developer journey.
Mike Filsaime Early Adulthood
Having finished high school and with a little bit of taste of success in the newly emerging field of technology and software, Mike Filsaime decided to enroll in New York Institute of Technology’s Computer Science program in 1986.
After completing his degree, he worked for his family’s car dealership, going from entry-level role to one of the general sales manager during until his mid 30s.
Mike Filsaime Professional Career
Though Mike had great interest in computer science and technology, he wasn’t a fully fledged programmer by trade until around early 2000s, instead opting to work for his father’s Toyota and Hyundai dealership. It wasn’t until the dot-com bubble during the late 1990s and early 2000s when he decided to try his luck in digital marketing and software.
Working For His Father’s Car Dealership
Beginning in 1988, Mike Filsaime decided to join the family business and worked for his father’s car dealership in Long Island for 16 years (1988-2004).
Some of his main achievements:
- Led a team of over 25 staff, including salespeople and finance officers.
- Oversaw monthly vehicle sales that often exceeded $1 million USD in revenue.
- Personally sold thousands of vehicles, making him one of the top-performing managers in the region.
- Was earning close to $300,000 a month from his salary.
- Integrated early software systems to streamline customer management and sales tracking—an early example of his software-business synergy.
Though Filsaime was earning close to $300,000 a month by 2004, he still pursued his side hustle in technology, which eventually was paying more than his job at the dealership.
However, based on his interviews, his sales manager position was a crucial part of his future success in digital marketing and software business, since his role taught him sales, negotiation tactics, and the psychology of selling.
Carbon Copy Marketing
Shortly after leaving the dealership business, Mike started working on his own affiliate marketing ventures, which ultimately resulted in the Carbon Copy Marketing course which helps online marketers to basically “carbon copy” the techniques and the sales funnels for creating:
- Opt-in landing pages
- Automated email marketing sequences
- Lead generation funnels
- Building email lists
- Launching digital products to sell
etc, etc.
After gaining traction, Filsaime started working on his other breakthrough venture, Butterfly Marketing.
Butterfly Marketing
In January 2006, Mike Filsaime launched his new product Butterfly Marketing, a course/software that helped entrepreneurs build membership websites, register affiliates, and build sales and lead generation funnels from already existing pre-built templates.
The Butterfly Marketing Manuscript which was a part of the product became a cult classic that led to many people not only buying the 200+ page eBook – which is about the psychology of selling online and use of technology/digital marketing, but also pirating it.
The 7 Figure Code
While working on his Butterfly Marketing platform, Filsaime also launched his video training product “The 7 Figure Code”, a $997 video course that gave step by step process on running on multi-million dollar online business. It not only taught the techniques and the know-how to launching a digital product, but also the mindset and the habits needed to become successful.
PayDotCom
Later in 2006, Mike launched his affiliate marketing platform/ecosystem that connected affiliate marketers with vendors.
Inside the platform after registering, vendors could add products they wanted to sell and give commission incentives for affiliates, and affiliates could pick and choose whichever offer they wanted to promote and get paid right away after selling through PayPal.
Compared to other platforms, it had a huge advantage of no delay or wait times to get commissions paid out. Despite the many perks, they announced in December 23, 2022, to shut down the platform.
DealGuardian
DealGuardian was launched in 2013 as an alternative solution to Clickbank, a platform for buying and selling info-based products, as well as recruiting affiliate marketers who can help promote one’s products.
Sadly, it didn’t get the same level of success as Filsaime’s previous products and DealGuardian faded into obscurity. It’s currently shut down and not working.
WebinarJam
Co-founded with Andy Jenkins, Mike launched WebinarJam later in 2013, when “live” webinars were becoming the hype in town.
It became a huge hit mainly due to its ease of use, affordable pricing, and flexibility in terms of perks the platform offered.
WebinarJam is still going stong as of 2026 and has over 75,000 businesses in over 40 countries according to their website stats.
Kartra
Building on his SaaS success, Mike Filsaime started pivoting into more CRM type of solutions, and thus Kartra was born in 2018, an all-in-one platform for teachers, course creators, and experts where they can make money online selling their video courses.
From building landing pages to automated email sequences, to managing your leads and customers, Karta has everything one might need in terms of digital marketing.
Kartra is still up and running in 2026 with impressive stats and figures:
- 60,000+ Kartra customers
- 718,000+ pages launched
- 3.4 million courses sold
- $1.5 billion in transactions processed through the platform
according to their website.
However, Mike is no longer part of Kartra, as he sold his shares and his stake in the company to start working on GrooveFunnels.
GrooveFunnels
After only 1 year since Kartra’s launch, GrooveFunnels was added to the list of Mike Filsaime’s creations.
The concept is the same, but the target audience is a little different. While Kartra is about content creators and coaches, GrooveFunnels sought to offer a better and cheaper alternative to ClickFunnels, Shopify, etc.
GrooveFunnels as of 2026, is still a very successful platform where people can sell physical as well as digital products from one single mothership for only $300 PER YEAR!
The main features it includes are:
- GroovePages – Drag-and-drop website & funnel builder
- GrooveSell – Shopping cart and product sales system
- GrooveAffiliate – Affiliate tracking & management
- GrooveMail – Email marketing & automation platform
- GrooveMember – Online course and membership hosting
- GrooveVideo – Video hosting with marketing tools
- GrooveWebinar – Live and automated webinar hosting
- GrooveKart – Full e-commerce store platform (Shopify alternative)
With over a million customers, you could say it’s Filsaime’s most prized jewel.
Mastermind Host & Speaker
On top of his impressive resume, and work track record of successful software launches, Filsaime hosts mastermind groups and events, and is often requested for public speaking during conferences.
Some people have mentioned that Filsaime offers consulting services, but it does not seem like consulting and coaching are his main priorities or something he is interested in. His focus is more on his actual day to day work and running GrooveFunnels rather than posting social media content or coaching.
Final Thoughts
Without Mike Filsaime’s contributions in internet/digital marketing, one can only imagine how different the digital marketing field would look like today.
Filsaime’s video courses and ebooks not only inspired millions of people worldwide to pursue internet marketing, but with no doubt, he has allowed financial and location freedom for hundreds of thousands of people all over the world.
Though Mike Filsaime is no longer in the spotlight, often avoiding most social media channels, Filsaime’s legacy and work still lives on through his software, products, and tools that we use for our every day marketing efforts: such as Kartra, GrooveFunnels, WebinarJam etc.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here are some of the most commonly asked questions about Mike Filsaime and more.
Mike Filsaime ethnicity & nationality
Mike Filsaime’s ethnicity is Haitian (he has mentioned about his Haitian immigrant parents), but since he was born in the United States, Mike Filsaime is an American by nationality.
Did Mike Filsaime graduate high-school or college?
Mike Filsaime graduated from Newfield High School in New York during the year 1985, and most likely he took a gap year before enrolling in university.
There are records and info about him enrolling in college in 1986, in New York Institute of Technology, but Mike explicitly never mentioned finishing his degree. He instead decided to drop out 2.5 years into his course and work for his father’s car dealership instead of studying in school.
Mike Filsaime family
In addition to his parents, Mike Filsaime sometimes mentions about his older brother.
However, it does not seem that he himself has any kids since he doesn’t mention of them in interviews nor share any pictures or photos.
He is married to Michelle Galvin Filsaime, a fitness/zumba instructor.
Mike Filsaime height & weight
Mike Filsaime is a film hobbyist and actually has an IMDB page you can actually check out, though information is limited.
His IMBD page listing says he is 5’6″ or about 168cm, but people generally add an inch to their actual height, so we can fairly assume he is 5’5″ or 165cm in actual height.
Weight wise, based on his pictures, Mike appears to have an average build, not skinny nor fat, which would make him around 145lbs or 66 kilograms for his height but he could also be somewhere in the 150lbs or 70 kilograms range.
What does Mike Filsaime do now?
Mike Filsaime mainly works on his business GrooveFunnels. However he has shared news about building Groove.ai, a platform for digital marketers that allows them to build various content with AI, but it’s still in the works, however some of the tools are already out and functional.