Indian Motorcycle leads again as dealers miss half of web leads, study finds

Indian Motorcycle dealerships once again topped the industry in online lead response, but a new study shows most powersports dealers are still failing to capitalize on digital opportunities.

According to the 2026 Internet Lead Effectiveness (ILE) study from Pied Piper, Indian dealers earned the highest average score at 55, marking the fourth consecutive year the brand has led the rankings. Top performers behind Indian included Harley-Davidson, Can-Am, Triumph and BMW Motorrad.

“With nearly half of powersports dealers in this year’s study scoring under 40, many brands and dealers are leaving significant opportunity on the table,” according to Cameron O’Hagan, vice president of metrics and analytics at Pied Piper. “The effort to improve is worth it. Historically, dealers who improve their ILE performance from scoring under 40 to scoring over 80 on average sell 50% more units from the same quantity of internet leads.”

Despite those leaders, the broader industry continues to lag. The average dealership ILE score held at 44 for the third straight year, extending a five-year stretch of stagnant performance.

Missed opportunities persist

The study, which evaluated more than 2,100 dealership website inquiries, found widespread breakdowns in basic lead handling:

• More than 50% of customers received no response within 24 hours
• Only 47% of dealers answered customer questions via email or text
• Just 13% offered an appointment
• Only half of dealers followed up by phone

The result: dealers are effectively missing about half of their online sales opportunities.

What top dealers are doing differently

Indian Motorcycle dealers stood out for consistent, multi-channel follow-up and low non-response rates.

• 39% used both digital response and phone outreach, compared to a 24% industry average
• Only 1 in 25 customers received no response, significantly better than the industry

Pied Piper noted that top-performing dealerships are far more likely to combine email/text responses with phone calls, increasing the chances of connecting with customers.

Performance gap widening

The study also highlights a growing divide in dealer performance:

• Only 11% of dealerships scored above 80 (fast, complete responses)
• 45% scored below 40, indicating slow or ineffective follow-up

Dealers who improve from below 40 to above 80 can increase unit sales by as much as 50% from the same number of leads, according to Pied Piper.

Simple fixes, slow adoption

Despite clear benchmarks, adoption of best practices remains inconsistent.

“More than half of powersports customers still receive no personal response,” says O’Hagan. “Dealers are twice as likely to be top performers if they commit to responding to web customers at least once each day and measure those responses monthly.”

For dealers, the takeaway is straightforward: faster, more consistent and multi-channel follow-up remains one of the biggest untapped growth opportunities in the business.