Logistics is one of those industries that, in spite of temporary setbacks, are never going to go away. One would assume that in the contemporary business environment, with so much focus shifting to IT, transportation would experience some setbacks. But, if anything, streamlined transactions and a growing number of online purchases only make the task of moving things from point A to point B even more important.
So, your future transportation and logistics franchise should have a bright future then? Well, yes, but as every entrepreneur knows, favorable circumstances only lay the foundation for success. Let us take a look at a couple of strategies that will help you to build upon this foundation and set your business for success.
Write a business plan
This can be considered “entrepreneurship 101” – no business can achieve success without a thorough business plan. But, what this document is and how it benefits your startup? Well, to put it simply, a business plan is a document that describes your ideas for business development and outlines the strategies you are going to use to get to the finish line. It represents both an excellent road map as well as a reference point you can use to measure current progress.
Let us take a look at some of the topics this document should cover:
- Executive summary
- Company description
- Objective statement
- Business and management structure
- Products and services
- Marketing and branding strategy
- Funding and financial analysis
- Financial projection
Be clever when assembling your fleet
When it comes to the vehicle fleet, standard wisdom says that the more, the better – and to be quite honest, this strategy has some merit. Being able to service more customers opens up the doors for more deals. But if you are starting from scratch, investing in an extensive fleet that runs the risk of being underutilized puts your business into an unfavorable position.
What you should do instead is to do thorough market research, identify the market corner that can produce the most revenue. Once you are done, look for the company doing quality truck sales, and get the vehicles that can service your intended customer base. There will be more opportunities to expand your fleet (and market niche) when you start making revenue.
Invest in killer customer experience
Since the transportation and logistics industry is undergoing a surge, it’s only natural that the competition is even fiercer than before. In circumstances like that, one of the best ways to put your business on the radar is to invest in killer customer experience. Some of the steps you can take in this direction are:
- 24/7 customer support
- Personalized communication with customers
- Streamlined and easy-to-use website
- Provide valuable content
- Focus on customer retention
All this move should supply your company with a unique value proposition and help customers pick your brand when they are faced with a couple of similar choices.
Cover all marketing basics
Having great service and being good at your job will amount to very little if people are not aware that your company even exists. So, it should be obvious that you should heavily invest in your marketing department. But, let us try to see what this broad term means in this day and age.
- Create profiles on all social media platforms – An easy way to engage in a two-way chatter with your potential clients and get a powerful launchpad for your content strategies.
- Facebook sponsored ads – Still the most relevant social media platform with the biggest industry-related outreach.
- Website optimization – According to recent research, mobile traffic has increased by 222% in the last and today covers more than 52.2% of global online traffic. Missing the opportunity to make your website mobile-friendly would represent a considerable setback in such an environment.
- Search engine optimization – Despite your best efforts, there is a chance that a great number of customers will find your business by accident. With the things as they are making sure your business stays on good terms with Google’s search algorithms should be your top priority.
Automate management
Running a transportation and logistics company is based on a lot of menial work that can considerably slow down the operations or increase the margin for error. Your job should be to address both these issues. Fortunately, the contemporary market features more than enough fleet management platforms that will allow you to monitor fleet status, optimize shipping routes, reduce shipping costs, cut the possibility for human error and improve your overall bottom line.
We hope these few suggestions will help you to use the favorable circumstances the transportation and logistics market is currently experiencing to grow your business and set foundations for success. The world around is changing at a rapid pace and providing excellent service has long since ceased to be the guarantee of viability. The contemporary business environment offers us many tools we can use to reach out to customers. The more of them we manage to use, the better.