CEO, Autoplay
Now
I lead Autoplay, the leading lead management system (LMS) for franchise dealer groups in New Zealand, and it’s growing quickly in Australia. My job is AI-first transformation, change management and the product itself.
Jason Nockels
CEO of Autoplay. Builder of things. Feilding kid.
Now
Alongside
- BioPortal 2025 to now
Lab results in. Answers out. Founder. I built it end to end.
- NZ Optics 2026
A trade magazine, rebuilt from the ground up (in progress). I built it.
- AGB Solutions 2026
Waste oil collection, with a new website and a driver app. I built it, and planned the launch.
Experience
NZME
General Manager, Commercial Platforms, Digital Products & Experience
Jul 2024 to Dec 2025
I led a team of 85 across commercial platforms, digital revenue products, ad operations, CRM and customer experience, and finished moving NZME off Salesforce and onto HubSpot.
- 85 people in my team
- 300 clients on new marketing and ops systems
- Salesforce to HubSpot enterprise migration, done
GM, Digital Revenue Products & Lifestyle
Feb 2023 to Jul 2024
On top of digital revenue products and ad ops, I took on the lifestyle brands: Driven, Viva, Canvas, Reset, NZ Herald Travel, Lifestyle and Entertainment. I turned Driven Car Guide from classifieds into a car-buying tool, and tried my hand at writing for the Herald.
- +27.4% ad revenue YoY from new premium ad products
- +50% click-through rate on those products
- +100% SEO clients YoY
- +20% Driven print revenue YoY after the rebrand
GM, Digital Revenue Products
Jun 2022 to Feb 2023
I was brought in to run ad operations, performance marketing, programmatic and the commercial digital product teams. I rebuilt how creative gets dispatched and brought agile into the teams.
- 20 to 30% time saved in creative dispatch
- +50% team capacity at no extra cost
- +32% team eNPS in six months
Omnicom Media Group
Consultant (part time)
Jul 2021 to Jul 2023
I did part-time automation work at OMD across media planning, ad ops and creative dispatch, so people spent less time on manual tasks and more on the thinking.
- 20% efficiency gains from automation
Strategy Director (contract)
Aug 2020 to Jul 2021
I ran performance and social media strategy at OMD for one of New Zealand’s largest retail groups.
Executive General Manager, Cruise Sale Finder, Webjet Group NZ (Online Republic)
May 2019 to Apr 2020
Full P&L for Cruise Sale Finder across Australia and New Zealand. I won the funding to re-platform the whole tech stack and brought in HubSpot for a single customer view. Then Covid arrived, and the brand was wound up.
- 26 people across Auckland, Melbourne, Shenzhen and Manila
- Award CLIA Online Agency of the Year, New Zealand
Co-founder & Head of Global Marketing, Mighway (Tourism Holdings, now Camplify)
Jul 2015 to May 2019
I co-founded Mighway, a peer-to-peer motorhome rental startup, and led product and marketing as we launched it in New Zealand and the US. We made a web series, ended up on Fox News, and grew fast.
- +200% booking revenue in FY17
- +112% booking revenue in FY18
- 4M+ views across a 30+ video web series
- +87% website traffic in FY17
Head of Digital, 1Above
Jan 2015 to Sep 2015
I was recruited to build the digital strategy that would take 1Above into the US and grow direct online sales. Nine months, one new website, an affiliate platform and a web series with travel influencers.
- 2x online revenue within 3 months of the new site
- US launch via Amazon
Digital Product & Content Manager, Grabaseat, Air New Zealand
Jan 2012 to Jan 2015
I ran product and digital marketing for Grabaseat, the airline’s daily deals site and apps, and produced the Grab a Random video series.
- +600% destination-page revenue YoY through SEO
- +69% revenue YoY after the responsive redesign
Online Manager, Jasons
2011 to 2012
I led the online team of analysts, search specialists, editors and web designers, all focused on ecommerce conversion.
Online Marketing Executive, UCOL
Oct 2009 to 2011
I helped bring UCOL into the digital age, and we were one of the early brands in New Zealand using Facebook as a marketing platform.
Insurance Consultant, IAG
2007 to 2009
Communications Consultant, Spark New Zealand
2005 to 2007
Awards
- Online Agency of the Year, New Zealand, CLIA Cruise Awards. Feb 2020
- Cruise Promotion of the Year, New Zealand, CLIA Awards. Feb 2020
- Digital Ad Operations Excellence, IAB New Zealand. Nov 2024
Education
Universal College of Learning (UCOL) 2007 to 2009
Bachelor’s degree, graphic design major, web design minor. Top graduate for design.
Side stories
- BioPortal 2025 to now
Lab results in. Answers out.
BioPortal manages water and microbial testing for fuel storage and distribution. Upload a lab report and AI pulls the results out of the PDF. Sampling gets scheduled, and the analytics show what is happening across every site. I founded it and built it end to end, and I’ve secured the first enterprise client: 27 locations.
- NZ Optics 2026
A trade magazine, rebuilt from the ground up (in progress).
NZ Optics is New Zealand’s ophthalmic trade publication. I’m rebuilding the NZ Optics website from scratch on a modern stack: around 6,000 articles migrated, plus Alfred Eye, an AI chat assistant for readers.
- AGB Solutions 2026
Waste oil collection, with a new website and a driver app.
AGB Solutions collects waste oil south of Auckland. I built their new website and a driver app that runs the day’s pickups from a phone. The marketing launch I put together went live on 5 October 2026.
- La Casa Nido 2021 to 2023
The Nest House, Mérida.
What started as an impulsive decision after a few too many margaritas in Mérida turned into two years of property development, with no experience, no Spanish and a pandemic. La Casa Nido has a space for a café or bar, a shared courtyard with a pool, and three apartments built for digital nomads. It was finished in December 2023. I built the website myself and wrote about the whole saga for the NZ Herald.
- Fire Cat Boom 2026
A retro arcade fighting game. Starring cats.
Seven fighters, seven stages, online player versus player, and it plays offline once you’ve installed it.
- Murray Grylls D.O.C Legend 2026
A calm card duel for Aotearoa’s wild birds.
A New Zealand native birds trading card game. Collect, duel, and install it on your phone.
- Ohakune-Matata 2016 to 2020
A house in Ohakune, run almost hands-off.
I bought a house in Ohakune to learn the peer-to-peer game. Channel management, wireless locks and automated emails kept it growing every year with almost no hands-on work. Then I ran a ski club’s off-season property the same way, and took its revenue from about $700 to $13,000.
- The Town Bike 2018 to 2019
An e-bike shop in Oamaru, run from Auckland. It didn’t work.
I set up an electric bike shop in Oamaru while working full time in Auckland: the company, the lease, the fit-out, the bikes, the website and the staff. It never took off. I learned a lot about retail, managing from a distance, and what it actually takes to shut a business down.
Word on the street
Jason has done a superb job at building social media at UCOL, creating one of the most successful examples of engaging students and potential students in New Zealand.
We enjoyed working with Jason in part because he had reasonable technical knowledge and was fun to be around, but mainly because he made astute decisions that lead to increased revenue
Jason thrives on developing clear and concise strategies but he is also equally strong at then driving through the implementation process
The video and marketing content produced under Jason's leadership was second to none and drove more traffic to our site than the tech team might have been prepared for.
Jason immediately stood out as more than just your usual General Manager. Jason is completely at home in the digital space and understands crucial concepts on how IT should work for a modern business.
Jason is a talented, creative and visionary leader
He just gets it. He's analytical, creative, technically astute and 'marketing smart'.
He also motivates with positivity rather than fear, which is somewhat rare these days!