By Glenn Hansen
NOTIFICATION
Are you talking to all shoppers ?
study on the effectiveness of internet leads is kind of like shining a flashlight on a roach in a restaurant kitchen . You don ’ t have to tell the restaurant owner the cockroach is bad .” That was Cameron O ’ Hagan , V . P . of Metrics and Analytics for Pied Piper Management , a data science company that helps retailers in agriculture , powersports and automotive industries .
“ For dealers , it ’ s not that they ’ re performing poorly on purpose or maliciously , they just might not be aware ,” O ’ Hagan continued .
Pied Piper recently released its 2025 ILE study – that ’ s Internet Lead Effectiveness – for compact tractor dealers in the U . S . The study shows how responsive dealerships ( by brand ) are to internet leads . Pied Piper reports the results by brand manufacturer , not by individual dealers , though dealers can work with Pied Piper independently .
Who won ? Kubota dealers , and they should be proud of their efforts , especially since they made improvements from last year ’ s results . But they shouldn ’ t get cocky about it . They , and the entire compact tractor industry , have a lot to improve on . Tractor dealers perform worse than powersports dealers in these metrics , and those moto dealers lag behind auto dealers .
Pied Piper spells it out in its study results , writing , “ In the 2025 compact tractor bell curve of performance , 4 % of all compact tractor dealerships industrywide scored above 80 ( providing a quick and thorough personal response ), while 59 % of dealerships scored below 40 ( failing to personally respond to their website
customers ). In contrast , 34 % of auto dealers score over 80 , and 14 % of powersports dealers score over 80 . ( Pied Piper has not yet studied “ outdoor power equipment ” dealers specifically , but this study of compact tractor retailers covers similar territory .)
“ The effort is worth it ,” said O ’ Hagan . “ Historically , dealers who improve their ILE performance from scoring under 40 to scoring over 80 on average double the number of units sold from the same quantity of internet leads .”
We ’ ll get into the study ’ s details later in this article . But before we get into that , let ’ s look at the importance of responding to customer communication that comes at dealers through a website . We spoke with industry experts , including Kubota ’ s Derric Lookenbill , director of dealer development .
All leads are valuable
“ Not all leads are the same ,” said Kevin Sabourin , an industry advisor and technology strategist . “ But all leads are valuable ; you just can ’ t spend a lot of time or money on the premature ones .” Sabourin points to real estate professionals who have done a lot of work to categorize and quantify leads based on where they come from . “ Realtors get it . Our industry is way behind .”
Sabourin said dealers need to take the time to collect and study data . “ The people side of every power equipment dealership is ultra important and that won ’ t go away ,” he said . “ But you need to use available technology to supplement the human side of this business , to help you find buyers , identify them , and then get
22 OPE + March 2025 www . OPE-Plus . com