At a Glance

• According to Secured Research’s 2025 vendor finance survey, only 38% of signed dealer agreements produce consistent funded volume within the first 12 months—the rest either go dormant or submit sporadically. And nearly 60% never achieve funding targets.
• The gap between signing and producing meaningful volume is rarely a sales problem—it’s an onboarding, enablement, and friction problem that lives in operations.
• Companies that redesigned their dealer activation process saw submission rates increase by 40–60% within two quarters.
• The cost of a low-activity dealer relationship isn’t zero—it’s the opportunity cost of the volume flowing to your competitor who made it easier to do business.

The Signing Celebration That Doesn’t Translate

The VP of sales sends the email. The dealer agreement is signed. Another name on the board. The team moves on to the next target.

Six months later, that dealer has submitted two small applications—one of which stalled in documentation. The relationship manager checks in, gets a vague “we’ve been busy” response, and files it under “needs nurturing.” Meanwhile, the dealer is funding three deals a month through a competitor whose portal took eleven minutes to learn.