Press

Infiniti, Mini and Mitsubishi dealerships had the industry's biggest improvements in responsiveness to customer inquiries on the Internet, while Lexus stores led the way for the second consecutive year, according to a newly released study.

Buick, Land Rover and Volvo had the largest drops in performance.

The fifth annual Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index Internet Lead Effectiveness Benchmarking Study measured the responsiveness of 13,637 dealerships representing all major brands between September 2014 and March 2015. The company gathers data through “mystery shopping” to score the dealerships.

While dealerships slightly improved overall with a 1-point gain in the industry average since last year, 17 of 33 brands had their scores slip this year.

Pied Piper takes 19 factors into account for scoring, including the speed of responses and whether dealerships answer questions -- or respond at all. The mystery shoppers submit inquiries through dealership websites.

“The reason we measure what we measure is that we've tied it to sales. We've tied it to dealership success,” said Fran O'Hagan, CEO of Pied Piper Management Company.

Lexus earned the top spot with a score of 70. Porsche (65) remained in second place, while Fiat (62) jumped from the seventh spot in 2014 to third place this year.