Sustaining & developing carriers’ business to guarantee the best service for shippers
Manuela Reis is in charge of partners relationships at Fretlink and an expert in the field. For over 20 years she has occupied a variety of posts (head of sales, sales manager, agency director…) with large, medium-sized and small transport companies. She joined Fretlink in April 2018, drawn by the vision of its leaders: “Fretlink has done what everyone has been wanting to do for years without daring to: they’ve reinvented the relationship between shippers and carriers by building it on a real win-win partnership.” As guardian of this relationship, Manuela explains why it is the cornerstone of the Fretlink model.
Upturning the power balance
“The main objective of transport actors today is to find the most attractive rates to maintain the relationship with their clients. But this is done to the detriment of their relationship with carriers, who are the ones providing them with capacity in the end” Manuela explains.
Manuela is well familiar with this reality, since she spent a good deal of her career looking to earn margin points from local carriers. “The main issue was profit at all costs. I never wondered how my suppliers were going to make a living at such rates,” she recalls.
Today, she is well aware of the limits of this model. “To secure routes, you need to make sure your transport suppliers will still be there in the long run. A transport procurement system based only on price works while offer is higher than demand, but that is no longer the case. By sticking relentlessly to this formula, loaders put themselves at risk,” she explains.
These past few years the market situation has in fact reversed, and carriers are no longer waiting for forwarders to manage their activity and find freight. As a result, large loaders are faced with a threefold problem. They need to guarantee capacity and ensure service quality, and at the same time stay within their allocated transport budget.
What is the solution? Change the relationship between shippers and carriers from top to bottom.
Know each other better to work better together
To redesign the way traditional tenders work, Fretlink developed a data-driven technological solution with a more to-the-point approach to transport rates, in terms of loaders’ needs and transporters’ expectations. The people in charge of Fretlink’s transport partnerships are constantly in the field and in touch with local carriers. This proximity is essential to get to know them better, train them to use our solution, and get their feedback.
“At no point do we interfere with the management of their activities. They stay completely in charge of their operations. Local transporters know their business and have expertise that we want to put to good use. We position ourselves with them as a real sales force,” Manuela insists.
With its solution, Fretlink provides them with valuable tools to develop and optimize their business. It gives them direct access to large shippers’ flows and sends them qualified freight requests that take account of their certifications, preferred routes and growth ambitions while guaranteeing them satisfactory margins.
“There’s no more need to delve through freight exchanges in search of flows, everything automatically shows up in their online account. All they have to do is accept or refuse our proposals. We’ve also digitized and automated their administrative processes. Their drivers can use our application to receive their waybill and confirm delivery with just a click,” Manuela explains.
Designing the transporter cockpit of the future
Fretlink’s latest fund round brought UTA-Edenred into Fretlink’s capital. They are the global leaders in BtoB prepaid solutions and TIP, and Europe’s number 1 in the rental, maintenance and repair of semi-trailer trucks. This strategic alliance today has allowed Fretlink to start building an exclusive service platform for its transport partners.
“Even when you’re a major transport company, it’s no easy task to recruit, benefit from reductions on grouped equipment purchases, or get financial benefits on fuel or toll charges. However, if you have less than 10 trucks, which is the case for the vast majority of carriers in Europe, it’s simply impossible to get benefits like these. We want to change this situation by giving our most loyal partners access to related services that will help them grow and continue their business,” Manuela says.
The future service platform will give them numerous benefits that will increase as new partners join up: purchase of trailers and trucks, prepaid toll and fuel cards, access to secure parking, etc.
“Adding up this new service with our operational solution will put us in a win-win situation with our transporters. We are giving them an incentive to get even more involved with Fretlink. Their loyalty will enable us in the years to come to give our customers the capacity and service quality they expect. Our model is based on the conviction that it is vital to give the same amount of attention and consideration to your partners that you give your customers,” Manuela concludes.
To have a chat with one of our transporter partnership managers and find out more about Fretlink, go to our website.
