How to Tell If It's Time to Update Your Shipping Strategy
by Marco Raye
With an influx of automated systems and constant shifts in market demands required to thrive in the freight industry, is your company maintaining a shipping strategy that gives you proactive foresight into truckload shipping fluctuations? The freight shipping industry requires more out of your truckload strategy than ever before mainly to sustain and grow your customer acquisition capabilities. While your company may have a plan used to deliver products, missing the insight of a freight shipping expert could be negatively impacting your ability to read industry demands that ultimately affect your capability to satisfy new orders and customers’ aggressive delivery expectations. This article guides you through the telltale signs that it’s time for your company to reconsider updating your shipping strategy, and how EasyPost Freight Shipping helps make this possible through one straightforward solution.
Truckload Freight Shipping Today
2018 ushered in explosive demand for transportation services, specifically LTL and full truckloads. The U.S. Gross Domestic Product expanded at a 3.5% rate, and the economy added a robust 312,000 positions to accommodate the boom. This surge in demand quickly led to shortages, shipping delays, exorbitant freight rates, and more problematic supply chain issues. Today this “capacity crisis” has since ended because more businesses now leverage past insights and shipping trends to shape and optimize their freight truckload strategy. Businesses working with freight shipping experts, like EasyPost, gain an agile operational layer allowing them to anticipate and pivot based on new opportunities and potential savings.
As today’s industry evolves, so should your shipping procedures. Having analytical foresight in an industry that so frequently shifts gives your business the ability to anticipate demand and make the wisest transportation decisions possible. To add perspective, think of your main competitors right now. Many use insights to identify new windows of opportunity through tools like technology, allowing them to shrink their margin of error and speed up their supply chain.
What’s stopping your brand from doing the same?
How to Know When It’s Time to Update Your Freight Truckload Shipping Process
The state of the industry calls for businesses to adjust around supply and demand through a strategy that is flexible, reliable, and data-driven. One way to identify the right time to grow your freight truckload shipping strategy is through a freight audit. Completing a freight audit allows your business to use performance data from past quarters for future sourcing and procurement of freight. Leveraging data to identify new opportunities for cost and time savings are how the best manufacturers, distributors, and all shippers of freight today maintain a competitive edge during times of consistently rising freight costs.
In addition to routine audits and infrastructure management, we encourage businesses to remain sensitive to other factors that can impact a brand’s ability to meet demand, including:
- Economy
- Technology
- Industrial Location
- Packaging and Recycling
- Fuel Costs, Taxes, and Subsidies
- Safety and Environmental Policies
What EasyPost Can Do For Your Truckload Freight Shipping System
EasyPost powers giant solutions to supply chains facing everyday logistic challenges through a blended approach where traditional practices and technological innovation work in tandem to increase your LTL and FTL shipping capabilities.
Here’s the EasyPost difference:
- Simplicity in the Face of an Ever-Changing Industry: The combination of supply, demand, and technology continue to change the landscape of freight shipping. A heightened level of strategic proactivity focused on data is how the best in the business optimize their truckload freight shipping system. EasyPost works both as your partner and forwarder, so your business can make nimble pivots that don’t disturb your end customer and allow you to focus on new corporate initiatives, like marketing or outbound sales.
- LTL Streamline: Historically, control over the LTL market has fluctuated between shippers and carriers following the 2008 recession. The reality of modern-day freight shipping is that these two resources need to work in conjunction to streamline the transportation of your assets in the fastest, cheapest operational schedule. Ideal for B2B transactions, Freight Shipping with EasyPost marries the shipping and carrier aspects of your supply chain through next-gen solutions. Adding our technology and expertise to your supply chain frees the time you would typically invest in coordinating between your business, shippers, and carriers. Doing so returns heaps of time and cost savings to our customers, allowing them to place the focus back on growing their businesses.
- Freight insurance: Included in our suite of shipping and logistics solutions is Freight Insurance, the easiest way to maintain peace of mind while your freight is in transit. Your business traverses a slew of obstacles to successfully move your inventory from point A to point B. Don’t let the careless error of not protecting your assets put you at risk of losing new and returning customers. Unlike other major insurance providers, our team works closely with you when you do have to file a claim to ensure your claims process in a fraction of the time it usually takes.
- 3PL Order Fulfillment Center Access: Where is your freight being stored after it’s picked up from the nearest port? EasyPost is unique in that we can serve as both your 3PL and your freight forwarder. Our customers speed up their product distribution through access to our Order Fulfillment product, designed to receive inventory, store, pick, pack, and prepare for delivery as your customers complete orders. Our warehouse facilities are spread across the nation (CA, UT, PA, KY) to help customers reduce the amount of time inventory spends in transit from the manufacturer or to your customers. Best of all, through EasyPost’s flat rate discounts, you pay nothing until you ship a package. No hidden fees. No monthly costs. Nominimums to get started.
Today you learned more about the importance of maintaining a flexible freight truckload shipping system. You may have more questions regarding your current freight shipping strategy or how EasyPost can help you save on time and costs. If so, don’t wait. Contact our Freight Experts and let’s get started today!