Future Proofing Your Logistics Operation With the Right TMS Solution

Unforeseen disruptions and rapidly changing market conditions can stall business growth. However, a resilient supply chain, powered by effective logistics, enables adaptation and enhances customer satisfaction and profitability.

The recent Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse at the Port of Baltimore has exposed supply chain vulnerability, impacting local and international industries. Such incidents could disrupt your operations and ultimately affect profitability if you don’t have a reliable system in place.

Rising operational costs, lack of transparency, manual or inefficient workflows and inaccurate freight calculations are key indicators of inefficient logistics operations.

To future-proof logistics operations, industry leaders implement a transportation management system (TMS) to optimize their complicated, high-volume shipping operations and navigate supply chain complexities. At its core, an ideal TMS software is a proprietary, single-platform, multimodal route optimization solution that handles both outbound and inbound freight, including domestic and international shipping.

This blog will discuss the benefits of implementing TMS and what to look for when evaluating a solution. Additionally, we will review key takeaways from a recent webinar led by John Mead, Aptean’s senior solutions consultant for transportation, showcasing how the software simplifies complex logistics processes. Moreover, this blog will provide insights into integrating TMS into enterprise resource planning (ERP) software and partnering with a vendor with decades of collective experience.

TMS software facilitates effortless, one-click rate shopping across all carriers, future-proofing your logistics by optimizing modes and providing comprehensive freight audit capabilities with automated workflows. This streamlines shipping processes, cuts down on total shipping expenses, saves considerable time and enhances customer satisfaction.

With the right TMS, you can achieve the following:

1. Increased Flexibility in Meeting Customer Demands

Today's customers expect fast, reliable and cost-effective shipping options. Without an efficient multi-mode TMS, companies struggle to offer these choices. Manual processes and limited carrier options can lead to delays, missed deadlines and frustrated customers.

A multimodal TMS empowers you to fulfill customer demands by offering a wider range of shipping options at competitive rates. This empowers you to deliver a superior shipping experience, driving customer satisfaction and loyalty—making you the “shipper of choice.”

During the recent webinar, Mead showcased how users can manage inbound, outbound, domestic and international shipments across all transportation modes, including truckload, less-than-truckload (LTL), ocean, air and parcel. “So, automatically click 'Get Rates' and all your carrier rates that are on file will automatically return rates for your review and for you to choose,” Mead said. This solution provides real-time visibility and flexibility in choosing the most optimal mode based on cost, speed and customer requirements.

2. Reduced Shipping Costs Through Optimized Carrier Selection

Manually negotiating rates with carriers is time-consuming and inefficient. Additionally, traditional methods often lack transparency, making it difficult to identify the best carrier for each shipment.

With these TMS features you can streamline carrier selection:

• Carrier contract integration: Automate rate retrieval based on pre-negotiated contracts, reducing manual work and ensuring you leverage your existing agreements.

• Automated rate retrieval: Get instant quotes from multiple carriers within the platform, allowing for quick comparisons and selection of the most competitive option.

• Customized pricing: Set up custom pricing rules to account for factors like weight, distance and urgency. This ensures you get accurate and relevant quotes for each shipment.

• Multimodal rate comparison: Easily compare rates across different transportation modes to find the most cost-effective option. This empowers you to choose the best balance between speed and cost based on your specific needs.

With TMS, you can leverage automation and data-driven insights to secure the most competitive rates and select the optimal carrier for each shipment. This translates to significant cost savings and improved efficiency.

3. Faster Processing Times for Quotes and Shipments

Manual quote generation and shipment booking processes are slow and error prone. This can lead to delays in order fulfillment and customer dissatisfaction.

TMS accelerates these processes with features like:

• Real-time rate shopping: Quickly compare rates from various carriers within the platform, eliminating the need for manual inquiries and saving valuable time.

• Spot quoting: Generate instant quotes for urgent shipments, ensuring you can respond quickly to customer requests and potential disruptions.

• Parcel pre-validation: Ensure accurate rates and dimensions for parcel shipments before booking, reducing errors and potential delays during processing.

TMS automates many quote and shipment booking tasks, significantly reducing processing times. This translates to faster order fulfillment, improved customer service and increased efficiency.

4. Gain Unparalleled Visibility Into Transportation Data

If you can’t see it, you can’t solve it. Limited visibility of shipment data makes it difficult to track progress, identify bottlenecks and make informed decisions. Traditional methods often rely on disparate systems and manual data entry, leading to inaccuracies and incomplete information.

Transportation software offers unparalleled, real-time tracking and thorough data analytics to provide a clear picture of your transportation operations. These features include:

• Real-time tracking: Monitor the location and status of your shipments across all transportation modes in real-time. This empowers you to address any issues proactively and keep your customers informed.

• Data analytics: Gain insights into key metrics like on-time delivery rates, carrier performance and transportation costs. Leverage these insights to pinpoint opportunities for improvement and refine your transportation strategy. For instance, you can analyze which carriers consistently perform well or which routes experience frequent delays.

By future-proofing your logistics operations with TMS, you have increased visibility into transportation data, allowing you to make data-driven decisions that improve productivity, reduce costs and ensure timely deliveries.

5. Quick Access to Management Reports

Manually generating transportation performance reports is time-consuming and inefficient. Traditional reports often lack the granularity and customization needed to gain actionable insights.

TMS provides easy access to a variety of management reports, including:

• Dashboards: Get a quick overview of key metrics like shipping volume, on-time delivery rates and transportation costs. This allows you to stay informed about the overall performance of your transportation operations at a glance.

• Customizable reporting: Generate reports tailored to your specific needs and drill down into specific data points. You can create reports focusing on specific carriers, routes or shipment types.

• Key performance indicators (KPIs): Track key performance indicators to measure the effectiveness of your transportation operations. By monitoring KPIs, like on-time delivery rate and cost per shipment, you can identify areas for improvement and track progress over time.

• Detailed analysis: Analyze trends and identify areas for improvement with detailed reports and data visualization tools. These tools help you discover hidden patterns, enabling you to optimize your transportation strategy with data-driven decisions.

• Accrual reporting: Gain insights into future transportation costs with accrual reporting. This allows you to manage your budget and make informed financial decisions proactively.

With a TMS, you can instantly access the information you need to make informed decisions about your transportation operations to reduce costs and meet your business goals.

A Solution that Seamlessly Integrates to Your ERP System

ERP software consolidates all your data into a unified system. Serving as a single source of truth, ERP offers real-time visibility and operational insights to optimize efficiency, breaking down departmental silos whether you’re a manufacturer or distributor in the food and beverage, process, discrete or the equipment industry.

Ideally, TMS should also be able to seamlessly integrate with your ERP, billing and accounting systems. Integrating TMS into your ERP automates the sharing of shipment data to ensure integrity. It eliminates the need to re-key any data which saves time while significantly reducing human error.

This integration is a crucial step in future-proofing your logistics operations, ensuring data accuracy and operational efficiency.

Building on this foundation, consider the advantages of sourcing your solutions from a single vendor with decades of collective experience in your industry. This streamlined approach ensures seamless integration, eliminating the need for complex configurations and potential compatibility issues which is crucial during your digital transformation journey. Moreover, you also get holistic support, simplifying troubleshooting and maximizing the value you get from both systems.

Elevate Your Logistics Operations Now With Aptean TMS

Aptean TMS is designed to elevate your logistics operations. With streamlined shipping processes, automated workflows and rate shopping capabilities, the software facilitates efficient multi-mode transportation management.

Aptean stands out as a leading provider of purpose-built solutions, offering decades of collective experience in addressing the unique needs of various industries. Seamlessly integrating TMS with your ERP system, Aptean ensures real-time visibility and operational insights to optimize efficiency across departments. By sourcing solutions from a single vendor, you benefit from streamlined integration, holistic support and simplified troubleshooting, maximizing the value of your investment.

Future-proof your logistics operations with the right TMS. See how Aptean TMS can transform and automate your logistics operations. Watch the recorded webinar featuring John Mead and discover how TMS can help you streamline your logistics operations and reduce costs.