Steve Stauning

Steve Stauning, an automotive industry veteran and internet pioneer, is considered a subject matter expert in the customer experience and is a sought-after consultant who has worked with dozens of companies from small startups to large automotive OEMs, dealer groups and industry vendors in nearly all areas of leadership, sales, digital marketing, process and product development. Steve is an intelligent, thoughtful, resourceful and seasoned executive with more than 30 years’ experience in executive management, sales leadership, product marketing and management consulting. He’s a highly accomplished leader and with solid, successful experience in both startups and turnarounds. Currently, Steve operates a private technology and consulting firm, pladoogle, LLC, which he founded in 2009. Via his work with pladoogle, he interacts with both large and small companies in automotive and online media helping these firms to create sustainable revenue streams from their digital offerings. Prior to forming pladoogle, Steve served as the Asbury Automotive Group’s (NYSE: ABG) director of ecommerce. At Asbury, he was responsible for helping their 120+ franchises maximize the effective use of the Web and related technology to grow sales, drive fixed and variable revenue, increase customer satisfaction and gain operational efficiencies. Under his leadership, Asbury dealers consistently maintained industry-leading Internet sales results and market share growth. He joined Asbury after serving as the director of the Web Solutions division of the Reynolds & Reynolds Company. At Reynolds & Reynolds, he led the team that successfully sold, designed, built and maintained over 7,000 automotive dealer websites. Prior to his time with Reynolds & Reynolds, he served as general manager for Dealer Web Services at Dealer Specialties (now Dominion Dealer Services), where he oversaw the development and execution of data and internet-related services for Dealer Specialties’ 10,000+ automotive customers. In addition to his executive career, Steve helped launch and serves on the advisory board for Dealers United (www.dealersunited.com). He also oversees and hosts regular, full-length live video training webcasts for Undeniable Advantage Live! (www.undeniableadvantage.com). For more than three decades, Steve has established himself as a thought leader in the fields of management, sales and digital marketing. His leadership and management blog, AskTheManager.com, enjoys thousands of visitors each week; as does his sales and management training site, SteveStauning.com. He is a popular keynote speaker at automotive and digital marketing conferences; and has been a featured writer for many industry publications, including his regular column currently featured in Car Biz Today magazine. With Steve’s vast and unique experience on the retail, vendor and consultant sides of the automotive and ecommerce spaces, he brings a distinctive skill set and perspective to the clients he serves. Additionally, he is widely considered one of the top industry experts in digital marketing, social media, ecommerce, leadership and sales processes.