Written by: Sam Sims
Ducati has done it again. For the second-consecutive year the Bologna-based motorcycle manufacturer has topped the rankings of the Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index U.S. Motorcycle Industry Benchmarking Study.
Stateside Ducati dealerships took the highest score in the study that measured “dealership treatment of motorcycle shoppers, with rankings by brand determined by the patent-pending Pied Piper PSI process, which ties ‘mystery shopping’ measurement and scoring to industry sales success.”
The drive behind the Pied Piper PSI is to measure how effectively U.S. motorcycle dealerships help shoppers become buyers.
Ducati took the top ranking with 116 points, which was up two points from its 2014 score. Following four points back was Harley-Davidson. Together, Ducati and Harley-Davidson have ranked either first, second or third for the past nine-straight years.
Fourth in rankings just two points behind The Motor Company was Victory Motorcycles, which was followed by Triumph (109 points) and BMW (108 points).
Displaying the greatest improvement in the study from 2014 to 2015 were all European brands – Aprilia (+10 points), KTM (+8 points) and BMW (+8 points).
Pied Piper reports that in total, 13 of the 17 brands improved their performance, resulting in the highest industry average PSI score of the nine years Pied Piper has been benchmarking the U.S. motorcycle industry.
Part of this improvement is due to availability of test riders, dealerships encouraging customers to sit on the motorcycles, and salespeople requesting customer contact info and trade-in information.
Pied Piper says it has found that on average, when motorcycle dealerships are ranked by their PSI score, dealerships in the top quarter sell 22 percent more motorcycles than dealerships in the bottom quarter.
“So much about the motorcycle business is difficult for a dealership to control,” said Fran O’Hagan, President and CEO of Pied Piper Management Co., LLC. “In contrast, dealerships can control the sales process used by their sales team, and the results are clearly worth the effort.”