The

ShipperCustomerJourney TEU

Checklist

Picture a roadmap

that charts the route a customer takes from first

encountering your product and follows him

throughout the sale cycle.

Recommendation

Research

Talk to

Pilot

Purchase

Repeat Purchase

The customer journey is the

sum of all experiences a customer has with your brand.

(which means that even after a sale, the journey is still underway)

Brand Awareness MarketingInbound/ Outbound

ContactSales Quote/ Rate Shipment

Account Management

Sample Freight Customer Journey

Why should freight forwarders care?

Because you need to stick out.

Ever wonder what shippers want?

The same thing forwarders want:

Lower Overheads

Faster Service

Accurate, timely and competitive rates

A relationship that works

The

Facts

Freight forwarding is highly fragmented. The top 10 ocean forwarders only control

10% of the market and the top 10 air forwarders only control ~25% of the market.

Over 20% of shippers believe forwarders don’t communicate openly and

transparently. And shippers are reducing the number of 3PLs they work with.

About 40% of shippers are unhappy with their 3PL’s IT services.

Increased rate volatility means that shippers are shopping around for shorter-term

contracts that shortens customer lifespan.

Source

Source

Source

40%

Source

An outstanding customer journey means that despite

competition, shippers will be knocking on your door.

Get on top of your customer journey.After you break down the stages of your customer journey, assess how

these four factors play a role at every stage.

Required Action

Incentive Problems Showstoppers

What does the customer

need to do to advance?

What is he focused on?

What is pushing the

customer to the next step?

What differentiates the

way you do it from the way

your competitor does it?

Does your customer know

what the next step is?

Is he clear about the

service you provide?

Do they recognize why you

are the best solution?

What is stopping customer

advancement?

Why is the customer

dropping off in the middle?

Click for a sample customer journey map

Dive right into

ways you can improve your shippers’ customer journey7

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey1/7

Embrace multichannel visibility

1

#GoSocial

Increase your visibility by getting out there on all channels, not just trade shows.

Position your business at a thought leader by providing information over social

media and expand on that with press visibility.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey1/7

#PossibleIdeasForSocialMediaActivity

Tweet latest rate changes

Blog about industry changes

Live-tweet shows you attend

Showcase key clients

Create a brand personality with employee updates

Find us online!

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey2/7

Get online.2It’s how companies interact today.

If an online prospect can’t generate a quote online or, worse, can’t even get in

touch, there’s a serious problem. Your website is the face of your company.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey2/7

This is how a prospect can quote from the

websites of the top 15 global forwarders:

Online RFP

73%

Email

20%

Telephone

7% In other words:An advanced forwarder

can beat 4/15 of the

biggest global forwarders

online.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey3/7

Rapid Turnaround

3

Time is money.For forwarders and shippers.

If you can book a ticket around the world in seconds online,

you should be able to book freight shipments too.

Learn more about these experiments

In an experiment with the top 15 forwarders in the world, only 30%

could generate multi-modal spot quotes in less than two days.

Slow quoting means costly overhead for forwarders and shippers…

and more chances to differentiate from these guys.

Quoting faster also means less overhead per quote.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey3/7

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey4/7

Self-Service4

There’s a reason “Buy it now” beats “Buy it later”.

Revolutionize the shipper customer journey by enabling key shippers

to instantly generate multimodal freight quotes online and enjoy:

Dramatically lower overhead

5% increase in quote win rate

Increased shipper satisfaction

Visibility into shipper activity

It’s an instant gratification generation.

Half of all website visitors will

leave a site if it takes over ten

seconds for a video to load.

See the research.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey4/7

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey5/7

Competitivevalue

5

It’s not about price.

Research has found that forwarders that

respond to RFPs focus only on

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey5/7

price.

Separate from the pack by providing :

Professional guidance

Comprehensive pricing

Clear, accurate quotes and

surcharge breakdowns

Thousands of forwarders are competing

for business by squeezing margins.

See the research here

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey6/7

Automate.6But keep your relationship manual.

How do your sales executives spend their time?

Research shows that 44% of all time is spent

dealing with internal issues that can be

automated instead of managing relationships.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey6/7

The more automate, the more

time you free up to provide

customers with better service.

Source: CapGemini 2015 3PL Study

3PL Sales Executive Time Spend

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey7/7

Be there for them. 7It’s not just an account.It’s a relationship.

Improving the Shipper Customer Journey7/7

30% of all shippers don’t feel like communication with

forwarders is open or transparent.

Mistakes are inevitable with complex supply chains.

Keep customers in the loop to win trust (and business) by

being open, honest and prompt.

AKA 30% of shippers could be won over by a forwarder with better communication patterns(

(

The Customer Journey Checklist. Increase visibility with a multi-channel presence

Provide a killer online window-front experience

Provide break-neck service to reduce overhead

Allow customers to generate quotes independently

Differentiate on service as well as price

Automate processes to white-glove relationships

Communicate constantly

Are you giving

shippers what

they want?

Join dozens of forwarders that are

automating quoting, reducing

overhead and winning more business.

freightos.com