Press

"Well-run service departments focus on increasing customer loyalty, and the first service experience to drive that loyalty is a customer's phone call to schedule an appointment," notes Pied Piper CEO Fran O'Hagan, as a preface to the 2024 Service Telephone Effectiveness (STE) study. He points out powersports is failing — miserably — at picking up the phone. "Industrywide, 1 in 7 customers failed in their attempt to schedule a service appointment within a reasonable amount of time..." and that number is dropping for most brands. 

Don't think this matters to your dealership? After all techs are hard to find, right? O'Hagan warns you can kiss that customer goodbye if you don't pick up the phone! "Powersports customers who find scheduling service difficult vote with their feet by moving to another dealership or independent shop, or even getting rid of their vehicle." Can you hear me now?

It is not all bad news, Triumph surged 9 places from the 2023 STE study to lock in the top slot by a country mile. Other brands with the greatest improvement from last year were Kymco, CFMoto, HiSun and Kawasaki, all of whom improved their STE scores more than four points since the prior study. However, the performance of 16 brands declined, including Harley-Davidson, Zero, Suzuki, Moto Guzzi and Indian.