Digital booking offers freight brokerages big advantages. Read on to learn about them.
Times, they are a-changin’. Sometimes it seems like life is being conducted digitally in this age of smartphones and electronic everything. Logistics is an industry that is, historically, rife with late adopters when it comes to new technologies, but the push towards digitalization has gathered momentum. Digital booking is just one facet of digitalization for freight brokerages and asset carriers, but it’s an important part. Digitizing that one part can come with big gains.
Digital Loads Save Time
There’s less paperwork involved in digital booking; it’s one of the best parts about digital booking for brokerages and carriers alike. The system handles the vast majority of the paperwork, reducing the time both parties spend filling it out, reading it, and disseminating it.
Digital booking solutions that include freight matching (like Parade) can also recommend carriers with capacity who are likely candidates to want the load. This saves reps a ton of time searching for carriers who can take their load.
It’s important to remember that digital booking doesn’t just save time for freight brokerages. It saves time for their carrier partners, as well. When the booking process is quick and easy on the carrier end, they may find themselves more inclined to do business with the brokerage that made it easy.
You Can Get More Loads Covered
Digital booking offers a set it and forget it (well, not forget it, but it requires less attention; it’s akin to the difference between puppy-sitting and fish-sitting) approach to booking loads. Brokerages can get a load in the system, then find likely carriers for the load. Carriers can then go through the booking process at their leisure.
When you set up a Book Now with a competitive price, you don’t have to sit around and babysit it. There’s no need to haggle, no need to send mountains of paperwork back and forth via email or even fax machine.
On that note, digital booking is perfect for loads with a competitive set rate. When you’re not looking for an opportunity to improve your margins on a load, but just to get it covered, digital booking with a Book Now button is an ideal solution.
Digital booking allows you to not only get more loads covered but also to cover more loads in advance. Rather than working on same-day or next-day loads, you can set loads that are further out up for Book Now in advance. Because it takes less time, reps can get a load set up for booking and move onto the next one, allowing them to get ahead of the schedule, something that is difficult to achieve in today’s busy brokerages.
You’re No Longer Hemmed in By Hours of Operation
The vast majority of freight brokerages aren’t open 24/7. Business is done during the regular workday, and even brokerages with extended hours often don’t cover the entire overnight period. When you use Book Now, loads can get booked even when brokerage reps aren’t in the office to manage the paperwork. You don’t miss the opportunity to use a carrier’s capacity just because you aren’t open while they’re trying to find their next load. They can check what you’ve got available to book digitally and make sure their trucks keep moving, even in off-hours.
Parade also offers carriers the ability to book loads digitally from any device. 86% of fleets in the US are between 1 and 6 trucks, and there are between 350,000 and 400,000 owner-operators on the road today. The ability to pick up a load outside of business hours offers those small carriers, many of whom are owner-operators who don’t have an office staff handle their booking and dispatch, a chance to book your loads when it’s convenient for them.
If it’s time for your brokerage to begin exploring digital booking, you can reach out to our team here to learn more about how Parade enables customers to get on the digital booking bandwagon.