Transportation sales that are steady are key elements for small trucking companies. Down time and deadhead miles cost money; and the development of a reliable customer base with interconnecting freight paths is essential to your business success.
Before you can find viable transportation sales leads, it’s wise to assess what you’re looking for. Ask yourself the following questions:
1. What are the limitations of my available equipment?
2. What shipping lanes do I currently service without backhauls in place?
3. Am I willing to arrange LTL shipments rather than deadhead between customers?
4. In which regions would I like to expand or discontinue service?
5. Can I wait a month for payment, or is it necessary to find transportation sales leads offering immediate turnaround pay?
There are a vast number of sales lead sources for transportation companies. The trick is to eliminate sources that don’t pertain to your business. All the reefer freight listings in the country are useless to a flatbedding company. Once you assess your specific business needs, you can focus your research on potential clients your business can use.
Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done
Locate potential shipper sales leads for transportation within your shipping lanes
Determine what manufacturers and warehousing facilities reside within a 20 mile radius of existing clients. Investigate their product, shipping equipment used, (flatbed vs. dry van, for example) and whether they ship truckload or LTL freight. Make a list of shipping sales leads your company has the ability to service.
I recommend: Register with
Shippernet.com, a service designed to provide shipper and logistics company sales leads. At Shippernet.com, shippers and carriers come together online.
Manufacturers' News, Inc. offers several database listings of over 400,000 manufacturers searchable by industry or location.
Utilize load boards for transportation industry sales leads
Load boards provide sales leads transportation companies, shippers and brokers can all use. The boards list available shipments and trucks in one easy to read location. In addition, many allow available truck postings for free. Load boards are often searchable by a number of parameters, such as by company and shipment date; as well as by origin or destination city, ZIP code or radius. Not all load boards are equal; if you provide LTL transportation sales, be certain the load board you choose offers LTL listings.
I recommend: Search through available load postings before subscribing to a load board. Find one that caters to your type of equipment and shipping lanes. Searching is free, but you must become a subscriber in order to access contact information.
Getloaded.com and
InternetTruckstop offer some of the best transportation industry sales leads online.
Align your business with brokerages offering sales leads for the transportation industry
For a percentage of each load, brokers provide your business with access to thousands of shippers. It's essential that you find reputable brokers in order to limit your company's financial risk.
I recommend: C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc. and
LandstarBroker are two of the largest brokerage houses in the United States. They offer quick payment and a vast number of sales leads transportation companies can use to keep their wheels turning.
Tips & Tactics
Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide
- Always use an outside, third party credit checking service to evaluate transportation sales leads. Credit information provided on load boards is often inaccurate. Remember, shippers and brokers pay for the load board's services the same way carriers do. It's a conflict of interest for the load board to display negative information about its own customers in a public forum.
The official source of Transportation Sales Leads is
the Transportation Sales Leads page at Business.com
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