Recent Press - Automotive automotive mystery shoppers

It's one of the most bitter battles in the American automotive marketplace, and it pits two of Germany's luxury automakers in a grab for the brass ring. But this year, Mercedes-Benz is betting it can topple rival BMW to become the best-selling luxury automotive brand in the world's largest high-end market.

The maker has been staging a series of meetings with dealers across the country aimed at improving customer handling. Dealers, in turn, have spent about $1.5 billion to upgrade more than 90 percent of U.S. showrooms. The results appear to be paying off.

“Mercedes sets the benchmark,” said Fran O'Hagan, whose Pied Piper Prospective survey uses thousands of so-called “mystery shoppers” to measure how manufacturers are handling the sales and service process. Mercedes bested such stalwart competitors as BMW, Lexus and Audi in results released earlier this month.

And that's apparently helped it gain a leg up on BMW. It held a 2,000-unit lead over the Bavarian automaker for the first half of 2012 after narrowly losing the U.S. luxury sales crown in 2011. Anything can happen, especially if rivals BMW or Lexus ramp up incentives spending, Mercedes officials admit. But it's clear they are ready to pull out the big guns to grab the ring this time.

Mercedes-Benz dealers are most likely to deliver customers the sort of shopping experience they want – and then close the deal, according to a new study.

Asian luxury dealers were close behind, along with Jaguar and Cadillac, according to the latest Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index which uses so-called “mystery shoppers” to measure the way potential car buyers are treated.

The study looks at 60 different sales activities, from the simple act of greeting a customer when they walk into the showroom to providing a test drive. Surprisingly, salespeople proved reluctant to take one of the most important steps of all, actually asking a prospect if they're ready to close the deal.

“The world has changed dramatically with the advent of the Internet,” said Pied Piper research chief Fran O'Hagan. Twenty years ago, the dealer was the gatekeeper, controlling every aspect of the car buying process. Today, however, “A customer can go to the showroom knowing as much as you want. So, the role of the salesperson has changed.”

And so has the balance of power. The best dealerships recognize and adapt to this shift, he explained, noting that the pace of change is so rapid – and the best brands have adapted so quickly – that a company that scored third in the Pied Piper study in 2008 would rank near the bottom in 2012 with the same score.

Mercedes-Benz dealerships ranked highest in a study that looked how auto dealers treat customers.

Pied Piper's annual study sends thousands of secret shoppers to stores across the U.S. and measures how salespeople perform.

Some vehicle brands that score high in customer satisfaction surveys do less well when the effectiveness of dealership salespeople is measured, according to a California consultant. Mystery shopping consultant Pied Piper of Monterey, Calif., sent 4,419 shoppers to dealerships nationwide, from July 2011 to June 2012, to measure salespeople's effectiveness in selling cars on the showroom floor.

Mercedes-Benz ranked first in the survey and led all brands in 10 of the 60 sales activities measured in Pied Piper's Prospect Satisfaction Index. For example, Mercedes led in salesperson introductions, offering a thorough test drive and focusing attention on important features. Mercedes was followed by Acura, Infiniti and Lexus.

Pied Piper said it looked at everything leading up to the purchase decision, starting from the first contact by the salesperson to the customer's decision to purchase or not. J.D. Power's Sales Satisfaction Index asks consumers for their impression of a dealership where they had recently purchased a vehicle.

There are a lot of ways to measure customer satisfaction. J.D. Power talks to recent buyers. Polk looks at sales stats and customer retention. But the folks at Pied Piper do it the old-fashioned way: with secret shoppers.

Between July 2011 and June 2012, Pied Piper hired 4,419 secret shoppers to visit dealerships across the U.S. The shoppers scored each sales pitch on 60 different criteria: were they offered a brochure? Were they given a walkaround demo of the vehicle? Did the salesperson discuss financing options? And so on.

Now, Pied Piper's data has been tallied, and the firm has released its 2012 Prospect Satisfaction Index (aka the "PSI"). Overall scores soared, proving that dealers and their teams have taken previous critiques to heart. Fran O'Hagan, Pied Piper's President and CEO, said that “This year's record high PSI results show that today's dealership employees work harder than ever to be helpful to car shoppers”.

Mercedes-Benz is still topping out in the U.S. when it comes to how its dealers treat shoppers. The Montvale, N.J.-based automaker, which was in the top five of the J.D. Power & Associates dealership experience survey last year behind Lexus and Cadillac, takes the top position in the latest Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index (PSI).

The PSI is a mystery shopper-based study that the firm conducted between July last year and June this year, using 4,419 hired anonymous people to shop at dealerships. Mercedes has been number one in the study for the past four years, based on a process that ties mystery shopping measurement and scoring to industry sales success. Acura, Infiniti and Lexus dealerships tied for second.

This is a good news/bad news, glass is half empty/half full type of situation. On the one hand, dealing with unscrupulous car dealers remains among the top consumer complaints, on the other hand a recent study reports that dealers are treating today's car shoppers better than ever on the showroom floor.

Especially if they're interested in buying a luxury-branded model.

Mercedes-Benz dealers can boast having the most satisfied shoppers in the auto industry according to the 2012 Prospect Satisfaction Index (PSI) U.S. Auto Industry Benchmarking Study conducted by Pied Piper Management Company in Monterey, Calif. Meanwhile, Acura, Infiniti and Lexus followed closely in a three-way tie for second place. Overall, twenty-four of thirty-four auto brands improved their prospect satisfaction scores from 2011 to 2012. Those at the bottom of the pack include Audi, Jeep, Kia, Porsche, Suzuki and Mitsubishi.

When it comes to the car buying process, the car pretty much does all the work, pulling in buyers with its impressive MPGs, like the Chevrolet Cruze or Ford Fiesta, or making them drool with offerings of the turbo inline 6 in the BMW 1M. Even completely new and fresh designs like the Kia Soul and completely redesigned models like the Hyundai Elantra are enough to entice buyers— all that's left is to seal the deal. But which dealerships leave customers the most satisfied?

The auto industry is seeing better days since it suffered a crisis back in 2008, when American car sales plummeted to one of its lowest points. Since then, the industry has rebounded and customers are now flocking to dealerships across the country to get their hands on a new set of wheels. But which dealers are performing up to par?

DETROIT (Reuters) - Mercedes-Benz dealerships were tops for the third straight year in an independent study issued on Monday of U.S. auto dealers that uses secret shoppers to determine how customers are treated.

Mercedes-Benz, a Daimler AG brand, was followed by Jaguar, a Tata Motors brand, and Lexus, the luxury brand of Toyota Motor Corp , which tied for second.

Toyota's U.S. dealerships and Chrysler's Ram pickup truck dealers were best among mass-market brands in the Pied Piper study. Fuller results are at http://www.piedpiperpsi.com.

Chrysler is managed by Italy's Fiat SpA.

Mercedes-Benz is in a tight race with BMW to overtake Lexus this year as the top-selling luxury brand in the U.S. market. Lexus lost sales because of the March earthquake and tsunami in Japan that curbed production.

While there are variations, the brands that scored the poorest were those that had fewest sales per dealership, where good sales people are difficult to retain, said Fran O'Hagen, CEO of Pied Piper, based in Monterey, California.