From complexity to possibility to reality.
I take complex business and customer challenges and make them simple, intuitive, and effective. Across 24 years agency-side, I've led digital strategy, experience, and marketing transformation, and I build the tools and teams that deliver. I live at the intersection of vision, design, and data, a strategic executive who still builds.
AI has been my focus for the last two years, and I approach it as a strategist and a builder. I conceived and built our AI Studio so we can understand a client and their audience better than they understand themselves, then shape a custom go-to-market play. What once took a full team 30 to 60 days now takes hours, so every opportunity gets our best thinking, the quick wins now and the long game for the customers they serve. Beyond the tools, I brought the whole agency along and put the governance in place, because fluency and responsibility have to scale together. I coined Human-led, AI-enhanced Creative. AI is a force multiplier when harnessed the right way, with people creating the vision, building the strategy, leading the creativity, and ultimately responsible for the final outcome. Creativity, critical thinking, and building relationships give the work depth and make it last. I lead with intention and own everything I put my name on, AI or not.
Proprietary 4-tool AI intelligence platform built solo. Covers competitive analysis, audience strategy, channel planning, and campaign execution. Intelligence passes between tools via JSON session files.
Co-founded DKY AI Council. Authored the AI and Data Privacy Policy, AI Mission, and Approved Tools registry. Publishes The Amplifier, a biweekly internal AI newsletter.
When DKY's partners set out to reinvent the agency, faster, leaner, with AI at the center as a force multiplier for human creative, I authored the vision for how, a strategy I named Project Apollo, and coined the principle behind it: Human-Led, AI-Enhanced Creative. The hard part was the engine. Client strategy work runs on disconnected tools: research in one place, audience thinking in another, planning in a spreadsheet, execution in a deck. Everyone treated that as a tooling problem. I saw it differently. The real cost was that intelligence got re-entered at every handoff and nothing carried forward, so strategy restarted instead of compounding. Nothing off the shelf solved it, and nothing handled both B2B and B2C well. I had directed custom software for our clients for decades, so this time I decided to build it myself.
I designed the architecture before writing any code: four tools in a deliberate sequence, a shared data model so nothing is re-entered, and a human-AI workflow where the strategist stays in control and the system does the heavy lifting. Every recommendation is grounded in DKY's own methodology and frameworks, not generic AI output. Then I taught myself Codex and Claude Code and built all four tools solo, Next.js, TypeScript, Supabase, Vercel, GitHub Codespaces, and 17 external APIs, with each tool exporting a JSON session file that carries its intelligence forward into the next.
Analyze -- competitive brand intelligence from up to 17 external data sources, scored across 9 strategic dimensions using the Harvard CI/PL/OX model. Produces executive briefs, competitive grids, and scoring narratives ready to present.
Audience -- persona development, customer journey mapping, funnel stage analysis, and messaging strategy. Replaces 4-8 hours of manual work with a structured 20-minute AI-powered flow.
Allocate -- PESO channel planning and budget allocation with a three-view campaign calendar. AI recommendations are grounded in the brand's actual Harvard scores, not industry averages.
Activate -- transforms upstream research into a full program pathway: creative direction, channel tactics, timelines, KPI frameworks, and a 12-slide client presentation deck that builds as the strategist works.
The impact shows up in the work: turning a new-business RFP around went from four to six people over four to eight weeks to two people in a few days, with more intelligence and business impact behind it. I proved it live in an RFP for RanchWorx, running the competitive analysis against AerWay through Analyze and including it in the proposal appendix. Estimated external build value: $125K to $175K.
When leadership asked me to upskill the entire agency, the staff ranged from power users to people who wanted nothing to do with AI. The proposed plan was to sit with each person and run weekly workshops. I took a different path. I started with a survey to baseline where everyone actually was, their skill, their use, their openness, their apprehension, and designed from there: a custom 12-level certification program built specifically for DKY's work, clients, and culture. The first four levels were required and covered the fundamentals, what generative AI is, how to build a prompt, safe use, using it with the brand. Everything above that was a choose-your-own-adventure path, up through running agents and building custom software. Teach a person to fish.
Full 12-level eLearning platform built with Next.js, Supabase, TypeScript, and Vercel. Features: full curriculum authoring, audio overviews, embedded video, graded quizzes (80% pass threshold), optional hands-on assignments, AI-powered quiz feedback via the Anthropic Claude API, branded PDF certificate generation, and a full admin panel. I personally completed all 12 levels.
Within the first two months of launch, the program reached 63% adoption across staff. Of those participating, 15% were new to AI, making the program a practical entry point as well as an upskilling path. Across the board, staff are averaging a 24% improvement in working knowledge of AI, directly supporting the agency's broader professional development goal.
Co-founded the DKY AI Council with agency leadership. Authored the AI and Data Privacy Policy for both staff and contractor use, the AI Mission and Perspective document, and the Approved AI Tools governance registry -- a living list of every tool personally audited and cleared for agency use. No tool gets agency-wide adoption without Donnie's review against DKY's compliance criteria.
Publishes The Amplifier, a biweekly internal AI newsletter covering tool updates, prompting guidance, practical adoption examples, and industry news. Personally trained staff on responsible and effective AI use. Coined and operationalized "Human-Led, AI-Enhanced Creative" as DKY's operating philosophy -- applied across client communications, new business positioning, and every level of the certification program.
Initiated and architected DKY's broader AI transformation strategy under Project Apollo and the DKY Intelligence framework. Defined the human-led, AI-enhanced service model. Designed five targeted AI agent environments aligned to future service tiers (Sprint, Flywheel, Navigate). This work repositions DKY from a traditional hours-based agency to a value-based, AI-enhanced strategic partner.
I build the platform vision first and align it with business goals: what the work needs to accomplish, then place the right specialists in the right seats, then execution from concept through launch. I think in systems and workflows, and the structure underneath is what makes a complex product feel effortless to use. I tie UX straight to performance, so design earns its keep in conversions. I treat a launch as the starting line. That's when you learn whether the idea held, read the data, dial in what works, and fix what doesn't.
Four dealer platforms, each built to replace a tool that had already failed. I created the vision, assembled the team, and led the build from Discovery to launch.
More than 20 WordPress sites and no unifying vision. I authored the enterprise-platform strategy, CMS, PIM, CRM, and DAM, designed the key experiences, and led the campaigns.
I led the vision for the ADMadvantage.com overhaul and personally did the UX and UI, then built the content engine and tools around it. 119K sessions, 9,550 conversions.
Every one of these tools had already failed once. Honda Powersports had tried prior vendors and off-the-shelf products that were limited, could not be customized, and did not scale. I led the digital strategy and UX/UI across the four dealer platforms built to replace them: the Demo App, the Eval Tool, AIM (the Auction Intelligence Module), and the Auction Platform, which reached across Honda's Powersports, Power Equipment, and Marine divisions. I started with the Demo App, and the trust it earned opened the door to every platform that followed.
Before designing anything, the account lead and I ran discovery to understand exactly why each prior tool had failed. From there I created the vision, built the RFP, and assembled a single team, a .NET custom development team and a UX/UI designer, that I carried across every platform for continuity. I led Discovery workshops informed by Design Thinking, built the user personas, requirements, and workflows, and had each approved by Honda's stakeholders before we designed or built anything.
The Auction Platform is where that discipline mattered most. Honda expected warehouse staff to handle unit photos and cataloging informally, over email or basic cloud storage. I flagged the risk and the bottlenecks that would create, and made the case for a purpose-built, automated workflow instead: structured lots, secure photo handling, clean association to each unit, and admin review, with a locked-down pathway so warehouse staff could contribute without access to anything else in the system. My recommendation was to invest in that foundation up front, mitigating the risk and unlocking real efficiency and scalability downstream.
Honda owned the project. I created the vision, assembled and led the teams, with the developers and UX/UI designers reporting to me. I drove the client meetings, tested and approved the approach and every build, provided course correction, and co-authored the SOWs and roadmaps.
General Shale came to us with more than 20 individual WordPress sites, loosely managed, exposed on privacy and security, with no shared vision to make them work as one. I was one of three from DKY who flew to Johnson City and won the business, then I looked past the cleanup to the real opportunity. I framed the brand-architecture decision, house of brands versus branded house and the tradeoffs of each, and authored a long-term vision for a unified, enterprise-grade platform to run the entire portfolio: a centralized CMS, PIM, CRM, and DAM; a digital-marketing, SEO, and SEM overhaul; a standardized Where-to-Buy locator; dealer and storefront location pages; on-demand document generation for sales sheets and specs; and a Pinterest-style way to save and share products and projects, all built for multi-language support, security, scalability, and merger-and-acquisition absorption.
I captured the vision in an extensive Executive Summary, then a Discovery brief, then a developer RFP, and sourced three development-partner proposals. The platform recommendation weighed .NET options (Sitefinity, Umbraco) against Adobe Experience Manager, which the parent company, Wienerberger, had already standardized on across Europe. I authored the $112K+ AEM Discovery SOW covering 22 brand URLs; vendor bids ranged from $425K to $649K, with a phased roadmap toward PIM and SAP integration and full AEM migration.
After the win, I aligned a Minneapolis developer with both WordPress and strong .NET capability to serve the short and long term. I personally did the UX and UI for every website enhancement, including a new standardized Where-to-Buy locator, an iPad-optimized Technical Binder, and Project Share, an internal SharePoint-based campaign that collected project photography while incentivizing the sales team. I also made the original case for HubSpot as their CRM, running a competitive analysis against Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, and Constant Contact; DKY became a HubSpot Agency Partner as a result. I remain the primary client lead, managing the day-to-day and every web project across their entire digital portfolio.
With our Director of Digital Marketing, Director of Social Media, and creative team, I helped design and launch the 2026 lookbook campaign, "Brick, the Foundation of Style." Integrated across paid search, Meta, Pinterest, and CTV. Google Ads: $0.99 CPC vs $7.85 industry average, 125 downloads, 14 leads per month. Meta: 1.8% CTR, $0.29 CPC. Pinterest: 107% of impression goal. CTV: 98% VCR. Brand lift: 15% recall. Organic social: 12.5% engagement rate vs 1.3% benchmark. Lookbook pages: 93% engagement rate.
I led the vision for the overhaul of ADMadvantage.com, and across more than ten years of full-cycle work I personally did all the UX and UI while directing the team that built it. The 1.5 rebuild, a war-room effort I led with our Director of Digital Marketing and our lead Content and PR Director, reorganized the entire site around what farmers actually do: Sell, Buy, Sustain, Learn, Locations, with a Salesforce API integration behind it. I picked, led, and managed the WordPress development team, presented every concept to the client, and authored the SOWs and RFPs for feature expansion. I also designed and oversaw the build of the Fertilizer Calculator, one of several interactive tools I brought to the platform.
I helped concept and drive ADM's content engine, In the Driver's Seat. I oversaw the technician who recorded the live interviews and posted the audio through SimpleCast, and I personally produced the companion monthly articles on the site. I designed the weekly email templates that went out through SharpSpring, and I made the case for HubSpot as ADM's CRM, a recommendation Tim Karlberg led into implementation.
On ADM's SHIFT learning platform, I helped populate the content and improved the UI at key touchpoints. The platform's turnaround was dramatic: February 2025 versus the prior year saw registrations up 170%, log-ins up 180%, lessons worked up 836%, and lessons completed up 991%. Email engagement held strong throughout, with 37 to 38% open rates per send.
Directed campaign destination pages for ADM's re:generations integrated campaign. Results: 119K sessions and 9,550 conversions on a $481K media investment. ADMadvantage.com February 2025: 27,100 sessions, 68.2% engagement rate with a 5% month-over-month increase.
Campaigns are where strategy meets proof. I lead cross-channel programs built on a clear story and measured against real outcomes. I want the creative to move people and the numbers to back it up. I also believe an agency should run this discipline on itself, so I built our own marketing into a growth engine rather than leaving it to chance. I set the direction, bring in the right channel experts, and keep everyone focused on the outcome that matters.
Annual integrated campaign program culminating in the award-winning ProPricing iPad App. New brand theme and full print, digital, and identity execution each year.
Led creative, digital, and UX direction across the Winnebago corporate site, the WinnebaGoLife lifestyle blog, and the Project Tahoe board-level prototype.
Transitioned the agency away from outsourced lead generation. Built the landing page, integrated HubSpot and GA4, and managed paid search campaigns generating 21 MQLs in Q1 2026.
Every year, Cargill set a sales goal and a marketing budget, and we built the campaign to hit it. As Senior Art Director on the account, I led the annual integrated campaign for Cargill's grain marketing program across multiple years: a new brand theme each cycle, then complete print and digital execution, brochures, websites, direct mail, and digital ads, plus art direction of photo and video shoots in the field with growers and dealers. The ProPricing brand identity I designed is still in use at Cargill today.
Took a complex grain contract data system used by Cargill's field sales team and translated it into a simple, intuitive iPad experience. Led the project from concept through final design, including UX wireframes, iOS technical specifications, and development coordination with Object Partners. The app contributed to a 40x increase in grain contract program enrollees. It earned NAMA Best of Show in Advertising (2014) and Best of NAMA in Multimedia (2013-14).
10 or more years managing and evolving the Winnebago corporate website. Designed and produced all print brochures, product detail pages, and digital assets. Art directed model-year product photography for 22 or more motorhome models annually. Platform grew to 290K monthly visitors with 35% year-over-year growth.
Conceived and led UX/UI design and development of the Winnebago lifestyle blog celebrating RV living culture. Grew to 70K monthly sessions. Email: 38% open rate, 12% click rate across 95K monthly sends. Managed developer Nik Rowell throughout the build and ongoing operation.
Directed a board-level interactive Adobe XD prototype for Winnebago's Advanced Technology Group showcasing their all-electric RV initiative. Covered market opportunity analysis, consumer research, technology architecture, interior design direction, and a phased roadmap for bringing the vehicle to market. Presented directly to executive leadership.
DKY had relied on a third-party lead generation vendor (RSW/US). Proposed and executed the transition in-house: competitive analysis of five to seven agency competitors, new UX/UI wireframes, WordPress landing page with HubSpot CRM integration and GA4 tracking. MQL pipeline growth exceeded the prior vendor's volume by 15% within the first quarter.
Three simultaneous campaigns: B2B (5.08% CTR vs 2.41% industry average, 10 MQLs), Faith-Based (12.13% CTR, 10 MQLs), and Outdoor (22.93% CTR, $2.25 CPC vs $3.33 industry average). Total Q1 results: 2,862 clicks, 79 conversions, $2.34 average CPC on $7K spend. 21 MQLs total.
This is where the executive and the maker meet. I sit on the leadership team and still get into the work myself, the strategy and the build, the right brain and the left. I care as much about where the agency is headed as about the quality of what goes out the door, and I do not believe you have to choose. When something is not working, I would rather propose the harder, better path than manage the comfortable one. I lead the digital department, set the standard for how we work, and keep the bar high on everything we ship.
Saw an agency that had run the same way for 18 years and led the overhaul that let it scale. Self-initiated and self-led across infrastructure, project management, and operating frameworks, with the right SMEs owning each piece. Finished two months before COVID forced the industry remote.
Bell Lumber (One Bell consolidation strategy), Hands to the Plow (multilingual ministry platform, 9 languages), Standard Iron (enterprise redesign), Bethany Global University, Lazy Bear Lodge, Integrity Windows & Doors (Agile methodology, UI design).
For the first 18 years of my tenure, DKY held at 16 to 18 people and ran the business and managed projects the same way it had since day one. Leadership wanted to grow but could not see past the roadblocks. I saw that growth meant modernizing the whole agency: the technology, the workflows, the processes, and a shared vision every staff member could get behind.
I researched how the strongest small and mid-sized agencies operate, shaped the future state, and presented it to leadership. In late 2019 I wrote and presented a proposal to replace three core systems at once: office-bound iMacs, physical job jackets, and a legacy Mac Pro server. I led all of it, from research and vendor negotiation through onboarding, and brought in the right specialists to own each piece alongside me.
I started with the infrastructure. Working with Technology by Design as our managed IT partner, we replaced the daisy-chained legacy server with a Synology RAID system on site, redundant offsite backup at DataBank, and supported 1GB fiber network drops. Standardized MacBook Pros on a three year lease cycle replaced the desktops, and a VoIP platform with chat and video replaced the physical phones.
To retire the physical job jackets, I researched all-in-one project and resource management tools built for agencies and brought in Tracy McCrory as a PM consultant. She was hired full time and became VP of Project Management. From there I standardized the full tech stack across creative, communication, productivity, and security, with firewalls, password managers, and staff security training led by outside experts, plus standardized workflows, file naming, and creative delivery.
With the systems in place, I built the frameworks that gave the work a shared language. The Wheel and Spoke model put a client's brand at the hub, supported by content and a website, with Paid, Earned, Shared, and Owned channels as the spokes. The Digital Playbook turned best-practice onboarding into a repeatable process for scoping work, defining audiences and personas, mapping journeys, setting KPIs, and earning client sign-off at every milestone.
The transformation was complete by February 2020. Two months later COVID hit, and DKY went from fully in person to 100% remote in two days without missing a beat. Clients came to us for help making the same shift at scale, and the agency grew from roughly 18 to 34 people in the year that followed.
In 2024, with the agency approaching 50 people, I saw that Workamajig could not scale with us. I evaluated more than 20 platforms, authored the recommendation, and led the move to Wrike with Workamajig kept as the accounting backbone. Working with Wrike's integration team, I built custom APIs and Workato workflows, writing some of the connections myself, so Wrike became the agency's source of truth and tied into Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Zoom, and Dropbox. I still own the full ecosystem of 90 or more platforms, our security posture, and the managed IT relationship today.
Full website consolidation audit and digital strategy for the One Bell initiative. Assessed three legacy sites and delivered two future-state sitemap architectures and page-level UX wireframe outlines. Core strategic repositioning: from product-category supplier to end-to-end infrastructure partner. Defined SME roles and secured client approval. Now in execution.
Global Christian ministry platform in 9 languages with 30 or more resources and thousands of downloads. All UX/UI by Donnie, development by Bjorn Hagstrom. Four initiatives: GearTalk Bible Reading Plan (custom web app with user auth, 4 Scripture streams per day, audio, and progress tracking), 9-language flag selector with cookie memory, donations platform overhaul (GiveWP, Stripe, ACH, cause-specific giving cards), and TranslatePress multilingual CPT architecture.
Phase 2 enterprise website redesign: 15-template modular design system, WCAG 2.1 AA compliance, HubSpot and JazzHR integrations, post-acquisition brand consolidation. Personally pitched the Phase 2 vision and execution plan. Assembled and led UX/UI and development partners through delivery.
Full website redesign: UX strategy and wireframing, developer RFP and selection, Agent Zero UI design management, 19-plugin audit, and mandatory code freeze and UAT enforcement -- held firm against client pressure to launch early. Prioritized a clean, stable launch over an expedient one.
I am a digital strategy and transformation leader, and the part of the work I love most is the turn: taking something complex, messy, or half-defined and shaping it into something simple, intuitive, and effective. Most challenges, I have found, are solutions waiting to be uncovered.
I work at the intersection of vision, design, and data. I set the strategic direction, shape it into an experience people actually want to use, and lean on data to prove it and sharpen it. What makes the combination rare is that I do not just point at the vision. I can build it. I am a strategic executive who still makes things.
My path runs from web designer and front-end developer to art director, UX/UI architect, and Director of Interactive, and for the last six years, VP of Digital on the executive leadership team, most recently architecting my agency's AI practice. Through every stage I kept building: brands and campaigns, websites and platforms, agency systems, AI tools, training programs, new ways of working.
I am wired to look for what is next, learn it deeply enough to use it well, and then bring others along. I care about the craft, and just as much about making the people and teams around me stronger. Teaching what I know has become one of the most rewarding parts of the work.
Away from work, my wife Ty and I are usually chasing our two kids between rinks and ball fields, relaxing on one of our great Minnesota lakes, or exploring a state or national park. I also love working with my hands, whether that is cooking for family and friends or building something out of reclaimed wood.
One thread runs through all of it: I love to build, I love to learn, I love to teach, and I love a challenge. I try to bring the same energy to my work, my family, and my faith: be present, give all of yourself to all that you do, keep growing, and do the work with authenticity and care.
