5 Signs You’re Ready for a Transportation Management System

You might be thinking, “Do I really need a transportation management system? I don’t feel like our process is necessarily broken. Is it really worth it? Is my company truly ready for one?” Yet, what if you could strategically reduce your overall logistics spend while transforming your team from being reactive and task-oriented to proactive and customer-oriented? What kind of impact would that have on your company’s bottom line? 

That’s exactly what I’m here to help you answer. Here are five signs that I always see when a business is ready to take the next step and invest in a transportation management system. 

Let’s dive in.

SIGN 1: Your Business Meets Any of These Qualifications

There can be some not-so-subtle signs that a business is ready to invest in a transportation management system. If your business

• has a freight spend of $1M or more,
• utilizes a mix of transportation modes,
• has multiple locations that utilize their own mix of broker and asset providers,
• procures a majority of freight via the spot market, or
• manages most of your data via Excel spreadsheets;

then consider yourself qualified!  There can also be some more subtle signs…

SIGN 2: A LACK OF EFFICIENCY

A lack of efficiency in your business directly results from a decentralized and very manual approach. Programs like Outlook and Excel were just never intended to handle a freight spend of $1 million or more. If your freight spend is $1 million or more, you’re probably working with a couple of hundred orders a month, with who knows how many stakeholders to help micromanage quotes, tenders, tracking, and tracing of shipments.

If you’re questioning whether your company has a lack of efficiency, ask yourself:

• How much time is being wasted across your organization with overwhelming manual processes?
• Does this process save you any money when it comes to freight spend?
• Do you know if you are utilizing the right carriers?
• Would contract pricing cost you less than the spot market in the long run? 

The bottom line is this is a reactive strategy focused on individuals’ tasks. To optimize your team and freight, you need a major shift towards being more proactive and customer-focused.

This is where Trinity’s transportation management system (TMS) can help you. All our Managed Transportation features a cloud-based TMS platform that creates a centralized freight command center, replacing your redundant manual processes with automation. Our TMS helps you manage the entire life cycle of an order and we can even integrate with your order management system to truly optimize your workflow. This means no more phone calls, typing out shipment details, or wondering where your freight is or when it’s going to deliver. Technology is one of the critical aspects of our solutions here at Trinity and also a major catalyst to transforming your supply chain.

SIGN 3: SEEKING IMPROVED PERFORMANCE

Efficiency isn’t just about getting faster; it’s about getting better – creating better team performance, better carrier performance, and ultimately improving your bottom-line company performance.

Is there room for improvement in these areas for you? Are your current strategies effective? Can they be measured? You may have answers to these questions that vary from location to location. You’ll usually find some of your distribution centers are better at procuring freight than others.

While a siloed strategy may have made sense for you at one point, companies grow and change. Considering change is a constant, a more wholistic approach will typically yield a better overall cost and carrier performance for you. This is what we consider to be the process part of our solutions. Data is a key driver for the strategy on this one.

On the surface level, it will appear that you simply are spreading your freight too thin across too many carriers or brokers. At Trinity, our Team of Logistics Consultants can quickly diagnose if you are leveraging your overall volumes to the best of your ability. Through strategic sourcing and customer-specific pricing, you can yield six to ten percent savings, sometimes even more. It can also have a significant effect on improving on-time performance.

Best of all, with Trinity’s Managed Transportation, you’ll always be able to track these metrics. You’ll be able to know exactly how your teams compare to the market and are able to adapt quickly when things change. 

SIGN 4: LACKing VISIBILITY

It’s hard to overstate the importance of real-time visibility in today’s supply chain.

When a customer or sales rep asks for a delivery ETA or if the warehouse needs to know what trucks are scheduled to come in; that can all fall back on your outdated and manual processes. Things like picking up the phone, back and forth emails, creating and sharing spreadsheets, that’s just your day-to-day visibility. 

What about those overall performance metrics and being able to measure your team or your carriers? Unfortunately for many shippers, there can be too many roadblocks for effective communication and a lack of overall supply chain awareness. 

However, with the right strategy and technology, visibility can shift from a challenge to a strength. Having access to a transportation management system takes over a lot of the heavy lifting for you, acting as a virtual control tower for all logistics updates and communication. With Trinity’s solutions, we included unlimited users who can access updates and data 24/7 via the cloud. We can even create push notifications where your team, your warehouse, and your customers can receive updates for their specific tasks automatically. For most shippers, real-time visibility has fully transitioned from an optional benefit to a business necessity – which is why Trinity brings all of this valuable information right to your fingertips. 

SIGN 5: needing BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE

Data has quickly become one of the world’s most valuable resources. In order to make effective decisions, proper data and analysis are needed, especially for logistics strategy or more enterprise-level decisions that reach far beyond the supply chain.

Now let’s say you do have access to good, tangible data. Even still, most likely your data is spread out among various laptops, email accounts, and carrier portals. Trying to compile complete and accurate information is difficult in itself this way, but the greater challenge is what can you do with this data?

That’s where working with Trinity Logistics comes in hand. We help compile and present a key analysis in a way that is easy for you to understand and collaborate on action steps for your company’s continuous improvement. Our customers are able to successfully leverage their data to lower costs, improve performance, and drive their company forward. There are many types of helpful reports you can expect to see such as carrier scorecards, customer profitability reports, to network analysis, and distribution projects.

take your business From Surviving to Thriving

So, are the your company’s signs pointing in the direction of a transportation management system?

If it’s looking like it may be the right time for your company to invest in solid logistics technology, then it’s time for your next step – finding the right provider. I understand you have a lot of options, but I’d like to recommend checking out Trinity’s Managed Transportation solutions.

Our solutions are completely customizable, but each comes with a cloud-based TMS, offering a wide range of capabilities to take over as your entire logistics toolbox:

• Order entry
• Tracking & notifications
• Reporting
• Load planning
• Document management
• Claims management
• Freight auditing and payment
• System integration
• Rating, tendering, and routing guide

Now, don’t just take my word – here’s what Ben at cfm Distributors Inc. had to say about working with Trinity’s Managed Transportation solution:

The best part of checking out Trinity for your future transportation management system? Your consultation is completely FREE and you’ll walk away with the knowledge about how your business can operate more efficiently and strategically with Trinity Logistics’s support. What do you have to lose?

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