Aftermarket sales and service operations are essential for the success of any OEM. They are untapped potential with lucrative profit margins, exceeding those of the sale of new equipment. As per McKinsey, successful aftermarket offers can even accelerate your sales by up to 40%. This calls for the immediate attention of Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), especially in 2026, when global markets are highly competitive and saturated with multiple players. In fierce market competition, losing customers because of poor aftermarket support does more harm than you can imagine. It can tarnish the OEM's brand value and impact sales for the long term.

What can OEMs do in this scenario?

There’s an urgent need to identify gaps in your aftermarket strategy. While the strategy may seem perfectly aligned with your goals and integrated with your system, it can still fail to compete with visionary OEMs, who are already doing everything to lead the aftermarket. Such OEMs always stay ready for the future and have made the switch to futuristic tech to ensure there are no shortcomings and flaws in their aftermarket operations.

Here are some gaps that modern OEMs need to fix in 2026 to retain their position as important player.

Key Gaps to Fix in Your Aftermarket Strategy in 2026

While bottlenecks, gaps, and challenges exist in every industry, they can be easily overcome with quick realization and action. You can still be the first mover to identify these gaps and gain leverage by finding their resolution.

1. Lack AI Capabilities

With AI, global industries are entering the future at 2x speed. Your sales and marketing teams might already be integrating AI in their daily processes. However, many OEMs use legacy software for aftermarket operations, including spare parts and service operations. Here’s why AI is important in the aftermarket:

• Reduces manual errors in part identification, which leads to exorbitant shipping and logistics costs because of wrong product ordering and storage.
• Automates key operations that directly impact spare parts sales, including demand forecasting, routine system checkups, and sales analytics.
• Enables AI-based visual search for missing parts, replacement parts, and damage assessment.
• Allows natural language processing on the system, which makes it easier to find parts with partial voice search.
• Helps technicians and service agents simplify service manuals and quickly browse to the solution using voice search and natural language.
• Predicts inventory levels to prevent understocking and overstocking in your dealer network.
• Assess vehicle and equipment damage and give repair estimates with the help of visual search.
• Enables AI-based learning, which makes your entire system and processes smarter with every interaction. 
• Enhances the overall dealer experience, who are able to offer better and faster services to customers. 

Solution

Along with the above-mentioned benefits, identify key areas where AI can help you streamline processes and develop an AI-adoption strategy that focuses on procuring AI-tech for your business. The best option is to look for an off-the-shelf AI-powered aftermarket ecosystem that covers maximum use cases. Such tech will help you save custom AI development costs and can be quickly deployed in your operations.  

2. Withholding Digital Transformation

With the help of digital transformation, OEMs are revamping how they operate and interact with business partners and customers across all fronts. Industry leaders are automating all key processes to bring down operational costs and reduce human error. This brings next-level efficiency to the operations, which is difficult to compete against without adopting digital transformation yourself. 

According to John Chambers, the former CEO of the US-based tech giant CISCO, “At least 40% of all businesses will die in the next 10 years, if they don’t figure out how to change their entire company to accommodate new technologies.” This also means OEMs who adopt digital fast will gain the first mover advantage and will lay down the foundation for a strong future.

Areas Where the Aftermarket Can Benefit the Most from Digital Transformation

Adopting digital transformation not only means investing in digital software, but your team should also start adopting the digital strategy and take a more holistic approach. Instead of bringing digital transformation to one aspect, OEMs can leverage the same on multiple fronts.

• Dealer Management: Managing a large network of dealers can be tedious and exhaustive for OEMs. They have to coordinate with thousands of dealers on a daily basis and ensure every dealer is on the right path to provide superior customer service. With the help of a dealer management system, OEMs can simplify appointment bookings for their dealers, help them create and manage job cards, simplify invoicing, and standardize operations across their entire network.‍
• Part Identification and Ordering: The majority of misordering problems stem from parts misidentification. By automating the process with the help of user-friendly tech that simplifies part identification, OEMs can fix the problem. Look for multiple parts search options and part highlighting & hotspotting features in the parts catalog software. Additionally, with an integrated order management system, dealers can track orders in real-time and share relevant updates with customers.‍
• Field Issue Reporting: Aftermarket service operations include several on-field hierarchies. Managing this chain of hierarchy is important to ensure faster service and maintain accountability within the entire aftermarket setup. With the right set of tools, OEMs can easily track field issues. In case a technician fails to resolve the issue, he can raise a ticket to the service manager. If the issue persists, the manager can escalate it to a higher authority (even up to the supplier). As the entire issue remains documented on the system, resolving the same eventually gets easier.‍
• Technical Documentation: To ensure the longevity of any equipment, technical documentation is important. They provide more clarity into the assembly and functionality of the equipment, eventually helping service technicians and speeding up repairs. However, storing and managing documentation for equipment is a challenge in itself. Instead, it is wiser to digitize documentation by storing it on a system from which it can be easily accessed by service technicians, even on mobile devices. 
• ‍Warranty Management: Warranty claims are difficult to verify. To differentiate genuine claims from fraudulent claims, OEMs can use a dedicated warranty management software. The software can help them track the entire warranty cycle, track defective parts, and reduce costs by replacing slow and tedious processes.
• ‍Customer Touchpoints: On the customer-facing side, OEMs are developing their own touchpoints from which customers can directly place orders. An advanced system even helps OEMs launch their full-fledged storefronts with online checkout functionality, which lets them utilize the dealer’s inventory to the full extent and increase sales holistically. 

Solution

Digital transformation is a must to compete with modern players. End-to-end transformation also takes time. Thus, a better approach is to start at both internal and external ends and reach the middle later. This means digitalizing the dealer side of operations with the help of catalog, warranty, and ordering tech, while also creating digital touchpoints for customers like an online storefront.

3. Reactive Service Model

To cater to the changing consumer mindsets of the 21st century, where every individual has access to the internet and negative perceptions form quickly, OEMs can no longer work with reactive service models. To go into more depth, in the reactive service model, OEMs only cater to the customer’s needs after recognizing a failure. In contrast, the proactive service model requires OEMs to equip themselves with all tools beforehand and stay resilient to all unprecedented issues and challenges.

OEMs need to proactively collect data to prepare themselves for any unforeseen circumstances in the future. When the challenge arises, they’d be properly equipped to find a solution. With demand forecasting, OEMs can track historical order data and get automated demand predictions for months in advance. With this information, they can control the manufacturing of parts and prevent issues like understocking and overstocking.

With IoT-enabled tech, they can even collect real-time equipment performance and run service and maintenance checks in time to prevent breakdowns.

Solution

In the aftermarket industry, OEMs can gain resilience by switching to a proactive model. Along with investing in smart technology, they will also need to train their management to stay aligned with the approach and try to identify areas of improvement before facing an impediment. AI tools and IoT-enabled devices will further help you in preparing your dealers for any challenges and improve overall service quality.

4. Poor Post-Sale Customer Experience & Retention

Due to high market competition, customers are aware of industry standards. They refuse to purchase from OEMs who are not able to meet their post-sales expectations. According to Salesforce research, 88% of consumers are more likely to repeat a purchase after facing a positive customer service experience. Likewise, 65% consumers also think of switching brands after facing a negative experience.

Even after understanding the significance of providing a good customer experience, multiple OEMs are not able to meet minimum customer expectations. While the approach is aligned at the strategy level, it loses focus during implementation when technicians fail to repair equipment in time and give vague explanations.

Solution

Poor post-sale customer experience tarnishes the image of both OEM and dealer. However, it remains the OEM’s responsibility to iron out all differences. Imagine using a smart manual digitization solution, which helps you manage the entire technical data of service manuals and allows dealers and technicians to interact with the data using AI. Technicians can directly chat with the system to figure out the solution and provide a quick resolution to customers.

5. Limited Dealer Visibility and Compliance Issues

Dealers can face several levels of non-compliance in the aftermarket. While some include non-compliance with OEM standards, like the installation of an older part and wrong pricing, and others can range up to legal non-compliance, like a mishap at the dealer site or violation of statutory rules and regulations of a particular geography. Unfortunately, many times, neither the OEM nor the dealer is at fault. Non-compliance happens because of reasons like a lack of transparency in operations, a lack of awareness, inadequate training, and misjudgment from supervisory personnel.

When dealers start working in silos, without any interference or supervision from OEM, non-compliance issues are likely to occur. On the other hand, tracking dealer operations at a micro-level is also difficult. It can lead to too many interruptions in the aftermarket business model, which was originally devised to make dealers self-sufficient at streamlining service operations for customers. Thus, defeating the entire purpose.

Solution

OEMs need to improve transparency across their dealer networks and ensure no dealership is working in siloes. For this, order management alone is not enough. They need a comprehensive dealer auditing system, complete with mobile apps and a web panel, to streamline the auditing process with greater accuracy and efficiency. Additionally, it provides OEMs the option to customize the auditing checklist, using which they can ensure all of their compliance is met. OEMs can collect data as per requirements and prepare in-depth auditing reports.

6. Weak Pricing and Monetization

OEMs can earn below-average profit margins on spare parts when they overlook demand and pricing. Unfortunately, this happens quite often in the industry. For some thought-processing, on losing faith in their ability to monetize their products, OEMs start implementing spontaneous markdown strategies, even on high-demand parts, low-margin products, and consumables. Weak pricing breaks the entire supply chain. While the markdowns temporarily help in improving conversion rate, they diminish the profit margins at both OEMs and the dealership level.

Another reason why pricing strategies fail is that OEMs often try to duplicate the successful pricing strategy of another region. There always remains a risk that they may fail to replicate the same success. This is especially true for completely new markets, where consumer ethnicities and behavior patterns differ vastly.

Solution

OEMs should carefully work on their pricing strategies. Products such as consumables, top-selling parts, and crucial equipment usually do not require markdowns and discounts. Instead, the markdown strategy should only be used to clear deadstock and stay afloat during seasonal downfalls. For example, OEMs can launch special programs for dealers and encourage bulk orders. Intelli Catalog’s discount module lets OEMs launch virtual fairs with flexible discount parameters and tiered slabs. Because of bulk orders, OEMs save on logistic costs, and dealers are also able to sustain high profit margins. 

Final Thoughts

Identifying the gaps alone won’t help OEMs much unless they are ready to take immediate action. This is exactly what we mean by the word ‘agile’, and agile organizations are the ones to reap first-mover advantage in the dynamic world. Likewise, by staying aware of the gaps and equipping themselves with the necessary tools and measures, OEMs can truly prepare themselves for the future. 

Instead of following a reactive approach to all problems, they can become proactive and move ahead of the market competition. The competition will also try to catch up, but with no gaps and vulnerabilities in your aftermarket strategy, you can stay confident to secure your position. 

Transform end-to-end aftermarket operations with Intellinet System. Book a free demo with our experts.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. How to identify these gaps in aftermarket strategy?

Aftermarket gaps, like a lack of automation, a decrease in sales because of poor customer experience, and an increase in operational costs, can be easily identified with the help of internal surveys at both the dealership and OEM levels. Likewise, data analytics on key metrics, such as sales performance, customer dropout rates, and increasing management costs, can help you identify other gaps as well. 

2. What are some key AI features that can be integrated into aftermarket operations?

The aftermarket industry is evolving. Some AI features that you should look for are:

• AI Visual Search: Search for spare parts using a smartphone camera
• AI Voice Search: Search using natural language and speech
• Demand Forecasting: Predict near-future demand based on several factors and replenish stocks across all dealers
• Damage Estimates: Use AI to estimate repair costs in damaged vehicles
• Claim Management: AI-based warranty claims management to distinguish fraudulent claims from genuine claims.
• AI-Powered Knowledge Base: AI knowledge base that makes it easier to interact with data using both chat and voice.

3. How to fix poor customer service experience at dealerships?

Identify the actual causes behind poor performance by conducting a dealership-level audit. You can use an off-the-shelf dealer auditing software to figure out which dealerships are meeting OEM compliance/standards, and which dealers are failing to do so. 

Based on the areas where dealers are finding to keep up, you can come up with relevant strategies. For example, if the poor customer service is because of delay in repair, you can conduct training sessions for the technicians, or use AI-based manuals which make it easier to search and find solutions.

4. How are other OEMs resolving these aftermarket challenges and gaps?

OEMs who are aware of these challenges are taking a more proactive approach. Either they rely on a completed ecosystem of relevant tools or have an in-house team of developers to build solutions for every challenge. However, investing in a readymade OEM software ecosystem is more time and cost-efficient, especially in the time-sensitive market of 2026.