Benchmarking sales staffing efficiency in dealerships using extended data envelopment analysis

This study presents an approach to benchmark dealer performance in a business-to-business setting through a rigorous efficiency analysis of sales staff allocation. Using a series of basic and extended data envelopment analysis (DEA) models on data collected from a survey of self-reported financial and statistical information, this research assesses dealer efficiency and compares the efficiency scores to traditional financial benchmarking. Findings support the minimization of outsourcing services that are customer interactive and highly specific to a transaction to differentiate the dealer from its competition. Integrating the results from DEA models, manufacturers obtain a comprehensive view of allocating sales staff to increase dealer efficiency and generating a complementary approach to traditional financial ratio benchmarking in determining best practices to other dealers.