Pied Piper pulls no punches with its annual industry report card. The 2021 PSI Internet Lead Effectiveness MC/UTV Industry Study (USA) was released today and the results will rankle some… truth hurts, at least for some, according to Pied Piper founder Fran O’Hagan. “We are not here to sway public opinion, PSI is intended to answer the question: ‘What happens when motorcycle or UTV customers visit a dealer website and inquire about a vehicle?’
“The answer to that question is that there is a lot of variation by brand… Top brands in the study performed well, while others; including some of the largest brands; have failed to improve over the past few years – despite COVID driving even more customers to dealer websites. Dealers for top brands improved their website response behaviors dramatically over the past two years, while dealers for other brands failed to improve,” notes O’Hagan.
“For example, the 2021 ILE study results show that dealers selling Harley-Davidson, Indian, BMW or Polaris sent an email or text answering a website customer’s question about 50% of the time on average… In contrast, Honda, Kawasaki, Triumph or Yamaha dealers sent an email or text answering a website customer’s question only about 30% of the time on average in both 2019 and 2021.”
We will share all the results in the next issue, but spoiler alert: even the best in the business are only getting it right about half the time!