How To Pick Technology That Drives Shipper Success
By: Tracy Neill
Tags: Technology, Shipping, Logistics, Transportation, Freight Shipping

Making your operations digital opens up a whole new world of possibilities for you as a logistics provider or freight broker. When you digitize your operations and reduce manual activities such as check calls, you do more than make your business more efficient and lower your operating costs. Digitization also provides tangible benefits to your current customers and helps you become an attractive potential partner to prospective shippers.

In this blog, we discuss the top three broker/3PL technologies that drive shipper success — and why you should make them a top priority heading into 2021.

Digital freight matching uses machine learning technology and powerful algorithms to automatically match your open loads with trucks from your network of preferred carriers. Designed to replace and improve upon load board technology, this software-based matching process happens instantaneously. With digital freight matching, you don’t have to post your loads to load boards, send bulk emails to carriers to inquire about capacity or phone dispatchers to find out what trucks are available. You can cover a load in seconds and move onto the next load.

The speed with which digital freight matching helps you find qualified capacity directly benefits shippers. The quicker you can provide your shippers with rate quotes and finalize capacity, the happier they will be. Digital freight matching augments your shipper service capabilities in another way, too. In addition to letting you find capacity quickly, Trucker Tools’ digital freight matching system lets drivers and carriers view and book your available loads 24 hours/day, seven days/week directly. All they need is an internet connection and our free driver app (or free carrier dispatcher platform). Fewer phone calls, emails and load boards help increase carriers’ profits and reduce downtime. The efficiency and convenience offered by Trucker Tools’ digital freight matching encourages carriers and drivers to keep running your loads. You can use carrier-friendly digital freight matching to build a robust carrier network, which ultimately benefits your shippers.

To say that real-time, digital visibility is important to shippers would be an understatement. In the last year, in particular, real-time load tracking has become a must-have for shippers. When shippers have access to real-time, digital visibility data, they can better manage their resources and identify inefficiencies in their operations — both of which help them be more profitable. Visibility has become so important that some shippers have minimum load tracking benchmarks that you must meet to move their loads. If you’re tracking loads with check calls, that may immediately disqualify you from working with some shippers.

Solutions like Trucker Tools’ real-time load tracking platform reduce or even eliminate check calls, while providing you with real-time location updates every five minutes. To find out where a load is, simply open our load tracking software or view the location of the truck in your TMS. With Trucker Tools’ real-time visibility platform, you instantly know if a truck has stopped or if the trucker has gone to the wrong dock. This instant access to real-time location data means you can update shippers on load status immediately, providing them with outstanding service. Trucker Tools’ real-time visibility platform also can be integrated with MacroPoint, Project44, 10/4 and FourKites shipper visibility platforms. That integration capability lets you automatically share visibility data with shippers in real-time.

When capacity is tight, providing a positive experience for carriers becomes supremely important. If you can provide a better, more efficient experience for carriers and drivers, they are more likely to want to work with you over your competitors. Increasing your carrier utilization instead of contracting with a new carrier or driver every time you want to move a load ultimately helps your shippers. When you have a loyal, capable carrier network, it’s that much easier for you to cover your shippers’ loads and to do so quickly.

One of the best ways to improve your relationships with carriers is to reduce the number of technologies they need to work with you. When you use the free Trucker Tools driver app with your carriers, you give them a single, unified technology platform that meets your needs — and one that helps them reduce their downtime. Carriers can use the load tracking and digital load matching features included in Trucker Tools’ all-in-one driver app with multiple brokers. The driver app also provides drivers with real-time info on parking, rest areas, truck stops, fuel prices, routing, weigh scales, CDL legal protection, load insurance, Wal-Mart locations and more. Carriers can use the Trucker Tools driver app again and again and they never have to download a single-use load tracking app just to move one of your loads.

To find out what makes Trucker Tools different from other tech vendors, read Trucker Tools’ Frequently Asked Questions for Brokers. Schedule a free demo of Trucker Tools’ digital freight matching and real-time visibility platforms.