Today, even small and mid-sized freight brokerage and logistics firms have access to powerful data streams that can provide valuable insight into how your business operates and performs. Analyzing metrics such as shipping accuracy, average dwell time and manual check-call/load rates provides insight into what your business is doing well and where it can improve. Understanding efficiency metrics can help brokerage and 3PL owners make more informed decisions, control costs, choose technology with a high ROI and raise revenue.
Trucker Tools’ real-time carrier capacity and relationship management platform, Smart Capacity, is built to help brokers and 3PLs automate many of the daily tasks and processes associated with these key metrics. Here, we discuss each metric and how Smart Capacity’s machine learning, processing algorithms, automated load tracking, and other intelligent features can help brokers improve performance significantly.
Improve Shipping Accuracy with Trucker Tools’ Real-time Visibility Solution
Shipping accuracy, i.e. hauling freight to the correct destination, is a key metric for most brokers and 3PLs. When you’re managing multiple freight loads, shippers and carriers, however, human error can hurt shipping accuracy. Brokers and 3PLs who use freight visibility solutions that provide highly accurate, continuous location information in real-time can monitor trucks to ensure that freight loads are delivered to their proper destinations.
Trucker Tools’ load tracking solution starts automatically when the trucker approaches the shipper’s facility and stops automatically once the truck leaves the receiver’s facility. Trucker Tools’ Smart Capacity platform receives freight location data from the Trucker Tools mobile driver app on the trucker’s smartphone every five minutes. If a truck is headed to the wrong location, brokerage/logistics staff members can see this in the Smart Capacity interface. Instead of making manual phone calls to the trucker or dispatcher to see where the freight is, operations staff can quickly view the location of trucks in Smart Capacity and notify the trucker/dispatcher immediately if an error occurs.
The Trucker Tools’ driver app leverages the GPS technology native to the trucker’s smartphone to transmit highly accurate location data to brokers/3PLs via Smart Capacity. Unlike cell phone triangulation freight tracking tools and many single-feature tracking-only apps, Trucker Tools’ driver app provides location data with pinpoint accuracy. Leading 3PLs Syfan Logistics and Choptank Transport have both achieved much higher tracking accuracy rates with Trucker Tools than with other visibility solutions. This high accuracy means that brokerage and logistics personnel can trust the location data they receive via Smart Capacity and can track loads from start to finish.
Monitor Driver Detention Time with Smart Capacity’s Detention Alerts
Every minute that a trucker spends idling at a shipper or receiver’s dock hurts efficiency for your brokerage/3PL, the carrier, and your shipper. Decreasing driver detention can increase revenue for your brokerage or logistics business, strengthen relationships with preferred carriers and help you meet on-time delivery goals. Driver detention can often be alleviated with real-time communication between truckers, dispatchers, brokers/3PLs and shippers/receivers.
That’s why in early 2019 Trucker Tools launched a new feature called Detention Alerts. Detention Alerts allow Smart Capacity users to set up automatic notifications to deliver any time that a carrier is detained or dwells at a shipper or receiver location too long. Smart Capacity users receive notifications when a truck is detained for more than the allotted time. (Alerts can be configured for whatever time length the broker/3PL chooses.) This notification encourages brokerage and logistics staff members to be proactive in addressing detention by calling the shipper or receiver to help expedite loading or unloading.
Using tools like Smart Capacity’s Detention Alerts can help freight brokers and logistics providers improve their dwell time metrics, which ultimately increases overall efficiency for the business.
Reduce Manual Communications with Trucker Tools’ Automation
Despite advancements in technology, many freight brokers and third-party logistics providers continue to rely upon manual telephone calls, multiple emails, and load boards to communicate with carriers. Needless to say, all of these forms of communication are time-consuming and aren’t always fruitful. You may need to make multiple phone calls to a dispatcher or trucker to check the status or location of a load or to inquire about capacity.
Solutions such as Trucker Tools’ mobile driver app and Smart Capacity platform automate daily tasks and communications for brokers and 3PLs. As discussed above, freight tracking is automated with Trucker Tools’ visibility solution, which can reduce check-calls significantly for your brokerage or logistics business. Syfan Logistics has been able to reduce its check-call volume by 30 percent by using Trucker Tools’ mobile driver app with its carriers. Reducing the number of check-calls per load for your brokerage or logistics business can often correlate with an increase in efficiency, which ultimately drives revenue.
Easy access to qualified capacity and automated load booking can further decrease the need for load boards, bulk emails to carriers, capacity inquiries by phone and other manual communications. Trucker Tools’ Smart Capacity includes a predictive load matching feature that optimizes how brokers/3PLs find and match with the best carrier for each load. Staff members can use Smart Capacity to search for capacity within preferred networks and book reloads with ease to maximize profits and minimize time spend on capacity searches. Using our newly launched Book-It-Now tool even allows carriers to accept broker/3PL loads instantaneously through the driver app.
Minimizing manual communications with carriers and simplifying capacity searches can increase efficiency for your operation, as well. Third-party logistics provider Choptank Transport has increased operational efficiency by 20 percent by migrating to Trucker Tools’ Smart Capacity platform.
To schedule a demo of Trucker Tools’ Smart Capacity real-time carrier capacity and relationship management platform, email sales@truckertools.com or call 703-955-3560.