CRM Tips for Freight Brokers | Episode 322

SPEAKER_01: 0:38

Welcome back. It's another episode of the Freight 360 podcast. We're at 322, and this week we're going to be talking prospecting and how to use that CRM to most effectively manage your sales pipeline. Um, but first make sure to check out all of our other content. There's hundreds of other full-length episodes. We've got lots of shorts and shorter length educational videos, blogs, downloadable content, all the good stuff. Go to freight360.net and while you're there, you'll find the Freight Broker Basics course. That's our educational option. If you're looking to get into the industry or bring on some of your new team members, I actually had a a couple of my um agents at our company that recently hired new folks and they use it as their training material. So it's perfect. Um so give that a you know, check that out and and um give it a consideration if you're growing your team and uh share with your friends. Leave that review and comment. You know, not all comments are created equally. Um, but regardless of whether it's love or hate, it helps boost the uh the algorithms or whatever YouTube does. So thanks for uh continuing to engage with us. Ven, what's going on in Florida? Welcome to December.

SPEAKER_00: 1:49

I am very I love this time of year, dude. It's like we don't get snow, obviously, but everybody puts up Christmas lights. So like there for sure is still a very Christmas vibe where like all the HOAs, all the communities, all the palm trees. Well, you're down, you've been on here this time of year, like they're all lit up everywhere. So like you literally can't drive more than a block before like you see like massive.

SPEAKER_01: 2:13

I love a good palm tree wrapped in Christmas lights. Like, my parents live in Fort Pierce, and when you go to downtown Fort Pierce, there's like there's this big circle area with a big palm tree in the middle, and it's got a giant palm tree wrapped in Christmas lights. And hey, I remember going down there for New Year's, uh like in going into 2020, and we were at the beach during the day, and then we're looking at you know Christmas lights at night, wearing shorts. It's great.

SPEAKER_00: 2:42

So our Christmas parade is actually tonight. So looking forward to that down, down, downtown. But like my two favorite ones are like when they do the actual palm fronds with the lights, so like the whole palm tree lights up right, like not just the trunk, but the top. And there's some cool ones that I've seen recently. Like it kind of looks like you know how willow trees have like the branches that hang down. Yeah, there's like a couple houses, uh like a neighborhood down the street from us, like enormous trees. They're like two, three stories, but there are hundreds of lights that just like hang down. And it kind of looks like you know, like Spanish moss when you go through like the tropical areas that hang down from those big trees, except it's lights, and when you go through it at night, it looks like lit up Spanish moss hanging from like these giant banyan trees. It looks super cool, anyway. Love this thing here. And also, it's not disgustingly hot.

SPEAKER_01: 3:35

So yeah, we've got we got our first couple rounds of like snow that's stuck here in Buffalo, and it's not too bad. Like, we got maybe because it always kind of compacts, we got like maybe three or four inches. Um, the whole country, pretty much, minus South Florida, um, got hit with some cold weather and snow this past week and and over the Thanksgiving holiday. So it's that time of year. Um, we actually put a notice out to our brokers yesterday uh to remember, you know, because there's supposed to be more bad weather coming across the eastern seaboard, and driver coercion is like a real thing, right? So, like if you as a broker, you know, try and force a driver to do something that is unsafe because you're you know you're threatening them with late fees and stuff like that, and it's out of their control because of weather, you can be potentially held liable or dragged into a lawsuit if something were to happen. So definitely, you know, make sure you're communicating very um you know upfront with your your customers and receivers and all that stuff about expectations when it comes to winter weather, because this happens every year and um it's nothing new.

SPEAKER_00: 4:50

That's a very good point. I and I totally agree with that, and I absolutely think you should be doing exactly what you said and making sure you're listening to what your drivers are telling you in regards to like road conditions. What made me curious as you were saying that is I'm like, I wonder if that limits a shipper's ability to charge back for late fees. Because I was literally going through this with um a client yesterday with one of the distributors that does, and they're enormous, like multi-billion dollar distribution center. I don't know if they're just in the Northeast, but there's definitely a lot of them up there, where they just fee the hell out of everybody. Drivers, brokers, vendors, just anything they touch. A driver's five minutes late,$250 fee. They don't notify you until they just short pay the invoice 30 days later. Like just one of those facilities or corporations that are kind of a giant headache to deal with. But as you were saying that, I'm like, I wonder if shippers ever actually do what we do as brokers, meaning like, hey, there's a ton of snow out there and driver was 10 minutes late. Do you think any of them are not imposing fees like they typically do?

SPEAKER_01: 6:06

Um My vote is no.

SPEAKER_00: 6:09

But I'm curious if you've ever seen that.

SPEAKER_01: 6:12

No, I mean, uh in my in my experience, whenever there's been like an act of God, everyone kind of plays fair. I've never had to Correct. I'm talking about just bad weather that is like marginally worse, not like, you know, determined natural disaster situation where it's like, you know, stated by FEMA or like a state that says this is, you know, Yeah, I mean literally anytime we've ever had an issue that was weather related, um, that we've never really had had it come down to a customer refusing to, you know, pay an invoice over a you know, or you know, if they're disputing the fees or and stuff like that. Um there's probably a gray area though. So I don't know, it all depends. Um it's usually pretty clear and obvious though. Like if a driver is stuck in like I'll give you a very clear example, because this happens in my area a lot, is um Interstate 90. So I-90 goes across New York State, and um our governor, Kathy Hokel, will put a an empty tractor trailer ban in place when the winds get above a certain sustained level, and it happened last week. So literally, you can't drive empty in a in a 53-foot van down I-90 when those are imposed. So you're gonna be slower when it comes to um using backroads and alternative routes and stuff like that. So if a if a customer has a certain pickup and hey, they they gotta be there by noon, and now they might be delayed an hour, it's as simple as like, hey, obviously the state issued a ban, so the the driver is gonna be late getting there. It's pretty understandable. Um I can't imagine a customer trying to throw I mean I can us I can understand them being upset because they're it's service, you know, potential service failure to their customer. Um but it's not like it's anyone's fault outside of the weather.

SPEAKER_00: 8:08

So and that's wild, by the way. It it reminds me, I was in uh Colorado skiing a long time ago, and I remember I don't remember which road it is that goes from Denver up into the mountains, but it's very much like the road I've because I've been on the road you're talking about, up by you, um actually for another ski trip when I was younger. But dude, I'll never forget it because we were driving up there and it was like the first time I'd been out there, and there was a tractor trailer that was on its side, and you could, I mean, the winds were so high, right? Like you could tell just even in the vehicle we were in, the winds pushing you back and forth. And this tractor trailer had to be every bit of a football field off of the highway. Like it literally was blown, it looked like a good hundred yards off the road on its side. And you're just like, you kind of don't think about it because you think a tractor trailer's super heavy, but to your point, when it's empty, it's like a giant sailboat with no weight in the back, and it's actually the opposite.

SPEAKER_01: 9:01

I'll give you examples of where I have seen fines imposed. Um so and we've used the example before about you know, take the northern route versus the southern ro, or take the southern route instead of the northern route, whatever. If a driver um by choice drives a certain way, and let's say they get in an accident, or they um, you know, you know, let's say it's a it's a partial, and because the one of their their first stop got delayed, right? And the the customer with the unrelated shipment might dock for pay on something like that. Or the accident thing because the driver's unsafe and drove too fast, and you know, whatever the case might be, if it's the driver's fault by all means, um, or the broker's fault for that matter. Um, you know, I can I've seen fines imposed and stuff like that. But when it's you know, hey, delay because there's a ban on the highway, or there's just congestion or traffic or um hurricanes coming into Florida, right? Like that stuff is just act acts of God. So um all right. Do we want to talk about this football match that happened on Sunday, Ben?

SPEAKER_00: 10:12

Oh, travesty. Dude, honestly, like I barely watched the second half. Like, I just ended up continuing to do work around my house and walked in and out of watching it because I'm like, this is just like a spiral into the city.

SPEAKER_01: 10:25

We're talking about the Bills and Steelers game Sunday afternoon. And when I first saw this on the calendar as a 425 game, I was like, what? Like, that's kind of an odd one to throw on a semi-primetime game. And then you like see the implications for both teams going into it, and it's like, wow, like the AFC North, right? Pittsburgh, Cleveland, um, Baltimore, Cincinnati, that division. Um, right now it's Baltimore and Pittsburgh kind of going, you know, they're just kind of you guys are like shuffling back and forth who's got the division, right? So like one, yeah, you know, every single game is gonna be huge for both both those teams. Um, because you guys are both at I think six and six.

unknown: 11:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 11:10

Yeah, and you gotta you're playing each other next, I think next week. So next week. Um, and and Buffalo, right? Buffalo pretty much has no shot at the division anymore, but is is just trying to get a wild card spot to make it to the postseason. Um so yeah, I mean it it it turned out to be a really good matchup. Um, Aaron Rodgers is one of my favorite quarterbacks to to watch, just because you know growing up and you know, becoming an adult and watching football, he was one of the great. It's kind of like Tom Brady, even though he's a Bills fan, we lost to him like every game. Um, but like just to see the the pure talent and abilities, um, it's really cool. And then he got, I mean, he he really he looked strong and your defense looked good. And then I feel like as soon as um Rodgers got sacked by the Bills, it kind of turned the tide of the game, and then it just the Bills just kind of went ran away with it. But I'll be honest, man, I was pretty nervous at going into halftime down seven to three. I I don't think anyone scored in the first quarter. Like it was just really defensive uh shootout early on in that game. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 13:01

And I think that was a really good whether whether it was a pun intended or not, like definitely literally ran away with it, ran the same play, basically, over and over again. The Steelers didn't stop it at all. And even TJ Watt said after, like, I've never been in the situation where a team has run the same play over and over again, and we weren't able to adjust and stop it.

SPEAKER_01: 13:23

Did you see the the the press conference afterward? Some a reporter tried to ask in Aaron Rodgers, like basically trying to hint, like, do you think Mike Tomlin's the issue? And he's like, I know what you're trying to ask, and I'm not gonna answer that question. Um, like you can't say that, right, when you're a reporter back.

SPEAKER_00: 13:41

And I would say there was something else funny they're talking about on Pittsburgh Radio. Somebody, I think it was somebody in Pittsburgh, um, like a sports reporter put out like a kind of a funny meme. He was like, Here will be the the the press conference on Tuesday with Tomlin. There will be a comment of something to the effect of like, well, you can't eat soup with a fork, and then they're gonna draft a 2018 Pro Bowl person who's in their mid-30s. And literally this week he said something to that effect, and we picked up somebody that was a 2018 Pro Bowler, and I think I think it was a receiver or something, guys like 35 years old. I can't remember his name, but it literally happened like yesterday or today or the day before. Wow.

SPEAKER_01: 14:26

Um, other notable matches from this past week. Can't you see that? Did you see the Giants kicker? What's that?

SPEAKER_00: 14:32

Do you see the kicker from the Giants? Dude, it's been like where he just duffed, it looked like uh like somebody flubbing a chip when he went to kick the field goal and he just like stubbed his toe and missed the ball.

SPEAKER_01: 14:44

No, I didn't I'll have to look that one up. I didn't see it.

SPEAKER_00: 14:47

Oh, it's hysterical.

SPEAKER_01: 14:48

That was this was probably a Monday night game then, right? You said the Giants?

SPEAKER_00: 14:52

Yeah, it was the Giants.

SPEAKER_01: 14:53

Yeah, I didn't I did not watch Monday night football. Um but Kansas City lost on Thanksgiving to Dallas. Um, so they're like the Chiefs Kansas City um playoff odds are like you feel like they're gone at this point, but they're still like KC has a has a real shot to like have a strong finish and make it into the postseason. Um it's getting less and less, obviously, as they lose games, but that's a notable one. Um Baltimore losing to Cincinnati, um Philly to Chicago. I believe Chicago is currently the number one team in the NFC right now. So Caleb Williams, um, all you Chicagoland folks looking good. Um so yeah, we'll see how we'll see how this uh the rest of this next five weeks pans out, but this is a fun time of year, man. And all you Patriots fans, you're back on top. Congratulations. That feels like that uh that drought didn't last very long. So right from Tom Brady to the Drake May uh era. So um anything else in sports? Nah, nothing else I've seen. I went to the Sabres game. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, I did see that. Yeah, that was cool. The Sabres didn't score a single goal, but like they I think they lost five to zero. Rough. Yeah. But all right. News, I do want to hit on this really quick. This new highway rule. Are you have you heard about this?

SPEAKER_00: 16:27

The the non You and I talked about it the day of like, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 16:31

So and this has been making like waves through social media and just the actual you know, media like freight waves and all that. But basically, and a lot of their stuff is confidential and like you know, there's they're not gonna publicly state a lot of different things, but essentially the the reporting on this is that highway is the first carrier vetting platform out there that has created a compliance rule for brokers that you can um flag a motor carrier if the registered owner of the motor carrier is a non-domiciled or limited-term CDL holder. Um, they haven't stated at the driver level how they're getting that information.

SPEAKER_00: 17:24

I thought it also included an MC that had a non-domiciled license driver looking for it.

SPEAKER_01: 17:32

There's so much unknown. But here's what here's what we do know, and I've seen this from carriers um ranting. I saw one yesterday, is that when you're so highway has a a lot of new tools now with load lock, and they're doing driver identity verification or carrier identity verification now. And what that includes is they're having high people that log into highway from a motor carrier do a facial scan and then have a scan of their driver's license, and then they use a third party to corroborate those two. So if you've ever like, there's a lot of things online where you've got to do that. I've seen it happen for I want to say it was like one of the online sports betting apps, like made you do something with your face and your ID to make sure it's a legitimate person and you're not having a second account. Um but essentially what they're saying, what they're saying is like, you know, they're using our biometric data, and when they see that license though, I I'm thinking that's where it's getting the non-domiciled from. Because I saw a picture of someone CDL the other day who was like failing this rule, and they sent us their license and it says non-domiciled CDL. So even though it's not illegal for you to hire a carrier or a driver that has a non-domiciled CDL, a lot of the um a lot of states are going away with it, and a lot of the private compliance tools are starting to um do things to get ahead of it. So I'm a little weary on this because I think when you cast a wide net, you're gonna have some legitimate exceptions that kind of get screwed by this. It's kind of like it's kind of like when you say if you have, you know, you know, if you only have one truck, we're not gonna load you, or if you have no inspection history, we're not gonna load you, or if your authority is less than a year, we're not gonna load you. When you have legitimate people that you know maybe fall into one of those categories, and there's other ways to vet them out, and basically just saying a blanket yes or no. So it is an optional rule. It has been highly, you know, encouraged that everyone turn it on. Uh but yeah, I mean, what are your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00: 19:47

Here's the thing that I kind of don't really understand. I know the one thing I want to point out is like my understanding, right, is that it's a pretty big bucket, meaning like there are lots of legitimate drivers that have non-domiciled CDLs that have absolutely nothing wrong and you should have no issue using them. But it also seemed that a lot of the fraud was happening with folks that had those licensed.

SPEAKER_01: 20:10

So to your point, when you send a broad network why they've created the rule.

SPEAKER_00: 20:14

Right. When you have a broad net, you're gonna catch people that shouldn't be in it as well as the people that should. So like that unfairly treats some carriers as the first thing. The part I don't necessarily understand, and I've read at least a more than a bit about this, was it seemed like the initial reason for non-domiciled were be when people moved to like a new state and they didn't have like a registered address yet, but they were driving, so they were able to get a new CDL in the state they were moving to, even if they didn't have their residence yet. But that part, like I just kind of didn't really understand, is just like a layman reading it, right? And because I'm like, the kind of the same thing happens with like a regular driver's license. Like when I move from like PA to Florida, you have like two or three months, whatever it is, to get your license updated to where you live in the new state. Like I had my PA license for like months, and then I had a certain period of time to then get a Florida license and then become the permanent resident of that state. And I'm not really understanding, again, from just a layman's point of view, under what scenario does somebody not know where they live in the United States where they can't put any address on it? Even if you like emigrated to the United States, like you moved to like why are you not able to put anything on it? That's the part that like I kind of don't necessarily understand is like, what is the actual use case for me not to have an address to put down? Like, when would I just not have any place that I got my mail or lived at? I get it that like I could be working all day over here.

SPEAKER_01: 21:48

Right?

SPEAKER_00: 21:49

Yeah, and maybe you're just staying in, I guess, hotels as a truck driver, and you're like, hey, like I just don't know what state I want to live in, but I want to keep going to work. I guess maybe there's the rationale somewhere in there. But I'm like, we got to get somebody on the show to explain like what are the legitimate reasons.

SPEAKER_01: 22:05

The non-domiciled CDL, if I'm understanding correctly, is it's a non-citizen, right? It means they're not a they're not a they're not a citizen of the US. So you could be issued a um, if you have a green card, for example, right? I'll just generalize like generalize it. You can get a non-domiciled CDL. That's how like you had a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00: 22:25

But you still have an address, right? Like even in those scenarios, like you still have an address.

SPEAKER_01: 22:30

Yeah, yeah, they have an address for sure. Correct.

SPEAKER_00: 22:32

So like, why are you not able to put that address in there?

SPEAKER_01: 22:35

Well, I mean, like this, the non-domiciled CDL that I saw the other day, like, there's an address on it. It just states that they're not a they're a non-domicile, they're not a US citizen, essentially, is what it comes down to.

SPEAKER_00: 22:44

Uh, okay. And the other thing that I'm at least again, anecdotally from visa or you know, whatever. Like, my wife's from Ukraine, so like she has a lot of friends that have come over and also came over during the war. And one of them is a truck driver. And we were talking with him like last week, and he's like, Yeah, I'm really kind of concerned that like I'm gonna get looped into this like bucket where it's gonna be harder for me to find work, even though like I'm legitimately here, I have all the correct paperwork. Like, there's no reason for me not to be able to do it, but now I'm in this bucket, and he's just like, there's just a lot of uncertainty.

SPEAKER_01: 24:07

Yeah, so yeah, we'll see. Um I think I think the dust needs to settle on this one, and and then we'll get some more clarity. But I think there's a lot of like knee-jerk reaction that some brokers are taking right now, and just basically blankets saying, like, if this is the case, we're not loading you. So um man, we've seen a lot, we've seen a lot lately with uh carriers. I I feel like it almost feels like some brokers, and I could be wrong, but it almost feels like some brokers are just trying to do whatever they can to um artificially adjust the market, right? Like trying to get rid of excess capacity in any way that they can. Um when the reality is we'd all just love if like, you know, demand to ship would just go up. You know what I mean? So anyway, anything else in the news? There's a lot.

SPEAKER_00: 25:06

Here's what ChatGPT said for like valid reasons. Non-domiciled CDL for foreign nationals. Um FMCSA allows a non-domicid CDL for drivers who are legally in the United States but are not yet permanent residents, including temporary visa holders, like you said. Drivers from countries with reciprocity, Canadian CDL holders may operate in the United States, Mexican, I don't know what that is, LFC holders may operate in the U.S. under NAFTA. Um NAP does not have U.S.

SPEAKER_01: 25:39

citizens, Chat GPT. It's the US MCA now.

SPEAKER_00: 25:43

Yeah. The US US citizens who recently moved states, drivers who legitimately move but haven't updated their CDO. But I'm like in that one, it wouldn't say non-domicide.

SPEAKER_01: 25:53

So if you're if you have a work visa or a green card, you would have a regular CDL.

SPEAKER_00: 25:59

If I'm hearing it, it says the examples are temporary visa holders who are allowed to work as CDL drivers are a TN visa, Canadian or Mexican professionals, H2B visa, seasonal workers, L1, intracompany transfers working in the U.S. operations, and E visas, treaty traders, investors involved in transportation companies. And then active duty military personnel service members can legally hold a CDL from their home of record even if stationed in another state, active duty reserves or National Guard. Um students or temporary residents in another state, out-of-state college students, seasonal workers who return home each year, drivers using their home of record for tax or legal reasons, drivers who are full-time over the road with no fixed residence, but maintain a legal address. FMCSA allows domicile where taxes, voter registration, and license registration match.

SPEAKER_01: 26:56

Interesting. It's a whole it's a whole topic in itself. Well, let's shift gears, man. Let's talk prospecting. Let's get to the meat and potatoes here. So I recently had a conversation, I think it was yesterday actually. Um, and you know, I was talking with this guy about the best way for him to um utilize the tools he has access to and look at potentially new tools, CRM, et cetera, to best manage his pipeline and for prospecting, and we're kind of talking through like what you should be logging, what you shouldn't be logging, and kind of some best practices to help you with you know remembering certain things, knowing when to follow up and what to follow up about, what should trigger you to want to follow up with somebody, things of that nature. And I think kind of like the the main the main takeaway that I had was like your CRM should not just be like a glorified digital Rolodex. It should be um it should track activities, not just data, right? And I think when you when you track the activity and and you kind of paint a bigger picture, that will help you hop into a call and not have to like dig through data points and you know try to back together what's going on with that prospect.

SPEAKER_00: 28:14

Yeah, from like a very simple sense, the way I always pictured it was like I'm able to outsource my short-term memory. Yeah, like anything that is important in any phone call I ever had with anybody, I don't need to remember. I put it there, it'll be there the next time I call them. The second biggest value is I don't need to remember, organize, or decide when to follow up. I just make that decision when I'm done with the phone call and it will just tell me later. So it operates as like snowballing, is also the thing in my head of like, you just once you use it enough, it just starts giving you the people you need to call every day, which is literally just the people you decided to call before and don't remember today. And then it tells you everything you should have remembered from all those phone calls. So like you can just go into your day and just start calling all the people you decided a while ago to call without having to remember, and then jump right into the call and see exactly where you left off and where you want to pick up the next conversation.

SPEAKER_01: 29:08

Yeah, 100%. Um, and what I really like to so I it's like funny that I say this, but I was talking with somebody, this is probably like over the summer, and they're telling me, they're like, Yeah, you know, I've never really been a big um CRM person. I literally just have like an Excel sheet or a Google Doc where I just write down my notes. And when I was when I was kind of talking through it, I was like, you gotta think about it. I said, if you like an Excel sheet is a super common one that people will use. They just put like, you know, name, phone, email, title, company, et cetera. I'm like, that is, you know, it it gives you such a limitation on what you can capture. It's all on just one linear line there on one row, and then the next row down is a different prospect and so on and so forth. When you get into a CRM, they're so dynamic, right? So, like I love HubSpot personally. Um, I've used Salesforce when I was at Conway, I used Microsoft Dynamics when I was at a previous brokerage, I used a proprietary one when I was in another sales gig. Um what I love about a good CRM like a HubSpot, though, is that there's different types of records and how they can interact. So you can have a contact, and then you can have a company, and then you can have a deal. Like, and these can all kind of work together, right? Like you might have um a company. Let's just say it's um Scott's Miracle Grow, right? Big company, right? Customer of ours, and that company, like you don't want to jot down all your individual details about a single individual under that company's record. That's gonna be the the cut the personal contact record who then is you know sorted underneath um Scott's Miracle Grow. And you might have five different people at five different locations that are all associated with that company, but they're individual and they have different um you know different things that they're in charge of, different truckload opportunities, etc. And then you could roll all that up into a deal, and it might be called a I don't know what you want to call it in any CRM, but it that's basically how your how your sales process progresses through your pipeline, right? So like it's you know, totally you're right, we're at the cold call and researching phase, right? And then it goes to like, hey, we've got you know opportunity here, we're in the qualifying phase, we're trying to figure out if there's a fit, and then it moves to like, hey, we're bidding on freight, and then it moves to like this is a customer of ours, right? So having a good CRM managing your entire funnel, everything right, it's the person, it's the company, it's where they're at in the sales cycle. You can't do that on an Excel sheet, right? You can't do that on a pen and paper, you can't do that on a Google Doc. Um, so that's why I highly encourage like you can get a CRM literally for free just to try it out. Like, I think HubSpot lets you have like up to 50 contacts um on a free account, and then I think I like my team has like the sales starter or something like that, and it's like fifty bucks a month per person, and you gotta we we got all of us in there. Um and we've got thousands of contacts and you know companies and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_00: 32:09

So the other one I've been using this year I really like um is a team. Okay. It operates pretty much like HubSpot. It's like almost all the exact same capabilities. It is a little cheaper, I think, too. But the reason I really started using it this year was what you just said. There's lots of information I want to capture about a lead or a company. And like manipulating the fields in HubSpot to me was a little more difficult and required a lot more work. Where in a Teo, like it literally took me less than an hour. And I was able to create like literally drop downs, multiple choice or things of like reminders for salespeople for what they should ask. What is the weekly truckload volume? Zero to 10 loads, 10 to 20 loads, 20 to 40 loads, 40 to 60, right? Like, and you can literally just pick one. Then I created one that says like, what does this company typically need from like our end? Like full truckload, LTL, reefer, open deck, dry van. So there's literally just multiple choice. Because when those questions are there, you don't have to remember to ask them. You just literally see them and go, I need to check these boxes. Another one I created in there was like, um, do they have an RFP? Check the box for yes or no. And then underneath it was like, what season is their RFP? And the reason having those things in fields in a CRM that is helpful is later you can sort by them. Yeah. So you could be like, I want to call every reefer prospect in Texas because whatever reason. Or I want to call everybody that ships this commodity. So I created another field for like drop downs for commodities so that later, like you could just every prospect you've ever entered in the past year, you could be like, hey, I want to call everybody that ships steel coils, or everybody I've ever talked to that ships strawberries, or everybody I've ever talked to that does open deck in this area. So those fields then become headers for columns, and then you can group whatever you want, whenever you want. Which to me I really like.

SPEAKER_01: 34:19

Absolutely. And it's funny you say that because like I know this is I'm gonna I'm gonna shift my comment to the TMS from the CRM for a second here. As you know, we've been evaluating a new TMS for Pierce this year, and one of the things that's really important to us is to be able to have a custom data field, right? For for literally a variety of reasons. Um, but it's it's a pain in the butt when you're when you're using a system and you have to try and use only what fields they have available, and then you're trying to force it to do something that it wasn't designed to do. Like, for example, I remember um working in a a TMS, this was probably like eight or nine years ago, and a customer required um us to have the the um what was it, the hob number, like the air air bill, what was Hob? H A W V. It was for uh imports. I gotta look this up so I don't totally for a Hob is a house airway bill. And so that has to do with um freight forwarding uh business, right? And there was no like data field that we could use to have that print to the customer's invoice. So then we're having to use the use container number customer reference number and put multiple things in there because we want one thing as the customer reference number, but we also wanted the Hob number on there. Um but like a lot of the new TMSs now, you can create custom data fields, and when you go to generate your invoice, you can choose which data points go on there. So back to the CRM, right? Being able to customize that stuff. And I love how you said things like you know, commodity and truckloads per week and stuff like that, because those are super important, right? And when you think about a CRM, most of these, whether it's a TO or HubSpot or whatever, um, they're designed to be like any industry, right? They're they're just generic trades. So if I go like when you look at HubSpot out of the box or any CRM out of the box for that matter, your default fields likely aren't going to all be um relevant to your type of you know your line of business, right? Um, and further, the fields that you do want to see by default probably don't exist yet, right? A lot of them at least. Correct. So like if you go into any CRM, very likely like commodity is probably not a default um thing or or a data point in there, but you can create them, and I think having that customized option is good. I I've just like I become like a super user of HubSpot, so I I kind of know my way around there and I'm I'm it's like second nature to me, so I don't I don't mind having to create that stuff. But I think you're gonna find a lot of these newer versions of CRMs and new CRMs that come to market are gonna probably be very, very um user-friendly, especially with all the automation and stuff that's that's out there now.

SPEAKER_00: 38:32

Here's here's another use case, and then I'm gonna go pivot to another thing. Is the other really important value I have in a CRM that you don't get out of a spreadsheet is almost all of them will connect to your email. Yes. And here's why that's super helpful. Everyone always goes to, oh, I can send automated emails to everybody. And it's just like everybody will just give me business just by pushing a button. That is not the use case I have found the most value in. The use case I think with connecting to emails to CRM is we talk to prospects a lot in the sales cycle. Like you might not be onboarded with a shipper for like four or five months, but they might have emailed you like 10 different loads to quote. They might have sent you a couple of things they needed help with, where you might have sent them a rate back and they went with a different broker. Like there's a lot of communication that happens in writing, in addition to phone calls that like you kind of need in front of you when you're on the phone. So, like if I've been prospecting you for six months and I've talked to you a dozen times, but you've emailed me like 10 other situations you needed help with. A last minute load on a Friday, I sent you a rate, we didn't get it, we didn't get the deal done, or a project, I quoted, it didn't come back. What we used to have to do is I'm looking at my CRM, remembering what I put in my notes on what you and I talked about. But then I would have to go in my email and put your email address in there to see all of the email correspondence and try to remember what we said in writing versus what we said on the phone. And when you plug your CRM into your email, when I'm talking to you as a prospect, I can literally just see all of the emails between anybody in my company and you and my phone conversations. So all in one place, I can be like, oh, hey, Nate, you know, how was your kid's birthday? I know it was coming up. I think it was last weekend. We're chatting about the small talk. Then I can see, hey, you know, I know we looked at a couple of those loads you needed help with last month. It looks like the one guy on my team sent you a couple rates. Did those come in a little high, a little low? Who did you guys end up going with? I can have like a comprehensive conversation with you about all of the communication we've had in both writing and over the phone and my notes. So, like, one, it seems like I'm a genius. Like I've remembered everything that has ever happened between the two of us off the top of my head, which is gonna make you have the impression that I am on top of everything and remember everything. The reality is, is like, I'm just using the tool to make me look better, right? Yeah, make me look smarter, make me look like I've got a better memory and look like I care more. When the reality is, is like, nah, I just have it all in one place, which makes it way easier for me to see all of it right there.

SPEAKER_01: 41:15

Yeah. Another one that I really like about email integration is I used to do this where I had like the Outlook plugin for HubSpot, and I had desktop notifications turned on. And right, you might email somebody and it's integrated with your CRM, and they don't open it right away. And then I get like a little pop-up on my screen like three hours later, and it's like, oh, Bob Smith just opened blah blah blah. What am I gonna do? Pick up right, like Bob is in the case. Yeah, I was just thinking about you right now.

SPEAKER_00: 41:50

Looking at my email.

SPEAKER_01: 41:51

Looking at my email. And it'll be like funny you called me, right? Yeah. So those are those are huge. Um and I I still use like the tracking inside a HubSpot. So like when I go to call somebody and I can see they've opened my last email, like my follow-up email after our last call. They've opened it, you know, four times, and the last time they opened it was I could see the timestamp, right? To me, that stuff is is super valuable. And I also don't think that like I guess I want your take on this. Do you ever like do you think it's ever appropriate to be like, hey, I saw you open my email last Tuesday at whatever time? No.

SPEAKER_00: 42:31

Um correct.

SPEAKER_01: 42:33

So, but what I what I have done is when I see that they haven't ever opened the email, I'll I'll lead with something like, Hey, I I got a feeling that like my email never came through you. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00: 42:47

Maybe you didn't see it or got buried, so I was giving you a call, right? I make it seem as if it was serendipitous, like just this like happenstance, which is I'm not gonna go on a tangent, but like I'm reading a lot about this stuff that we talk about offline, like consciousness and how all that works. And like, there for sure are studies that like when you are thinking about a friend or a family member, and then your phone rings and it just happens to be that person, that there is some connection. So, like, there is like basis and like I would say kind of out there science and studies that show that like this really happens in real life. Yeah. So like if I can use technology to make it seem as if it's happening more often, it also gives me something to talk about, right? Like, I'm not gonna be like, hey, it looks like you open my email three times. Um, why didn't you respond? To your point, I'm gonna go, oh, they keep looking at my email every Tuesday at 10 in the morning. Either they're trying to cover that lane again, whatever I emailed about, or they're looking for something, or they have time to do this. So they have the time. One of these things means it's probably a good indication that that's what I'm gonna try to call them next.

SPEAKER_01: 43:48

Which leads me to my next thought, which is tasks, right? Setting reminders. So, like literally every day, one of the first things I do before I, you know, put out flyers in my inbox, is I go to my task list in HubSpot, or again, whatever CRM you're using, and it I don't have to think about what I have to do today, right? I already know if I have like I like today, for example, I know that I have scheduled calls at I have a scheduled call at 1 15 Eastern, right? That's the time that we had pre-scheduled that call for. I have an additional one, two, three, four, five, six phone calls that I have to make that I don't have a set time on, but I know roughly when this afternoon I'm gonna make those phone calls. Um and those are pre-planned before my day even started, right? And I just continue to have that, those, those things pick up. And what I'd highly recommend you do is don't just, you know, people are like, oh, we get a question like how, you know, when should I follow up with a prospect, right? And we're always like, it depends, right? And there one of the things that's great about a CRM is you can like think about the trigger, right? Like, what should trigger you? It could be when is is there a news event? Is there a news thing? Is there a new distribution center opening? Is there an RFP cycle that's coming up? And you can you don't have to remember all this stuff. You just once you know it, what's that put in your task and boom, set and forget.

SPEAKER_00: 45:05

Here's here's the way I usually describe this of like I'm running a training. I'm like, mentally picture that like you've got to talk to this person like 10 times over three months, but it really should be almost like a one very long continuous conversation that has breaks in it. So how and when and what I'm gonna say in my follow-up, I'm literally deciding as I'm ending this call, right? I'm either asking or figuring out like something you said, like maybe your RFP is coming up, maybe you got some loads and you say, give me a call back Tuesday. Maybe it's based on like your tone of voice or when I think we should. But like the most informed I will be to make the decision on when I should call you next is literally right when I hang up the phone. So that's when you schedule the task. And I always leave a note for myself. I'm like, here's where I left this conversation off. Here's where I want to pick up. And I usually like start somewhere in the middle of where I left off. So if we stop talking about a shipping lane, but right before that we talked about your kid's birthday, my next call is how was your kid's birthday? Then I ask about the lane again, then I move the conversation forward. So it's really like one long conversation where you just pause in the middle and it's like kind of like watching a movie, except like when you turn it back on, you watch the 10 minutes right before you shut it off to get caught back up, just like on a TV series that gives you the recap, and then you move it forward, right? Like, in fact, that's really a good analogy. Like, just like a series you watch on like Netflix of like you kind of see the last synopsis of what just happened, you kind of refresh the conversation, then you move the story forward, then you get out, and you just keep doing that over and over again.

SPEAKER_01: 46:46

Yeah, 100%, man. That's like so the just kind of recap the prospecting funnel, right? We talk about a funnel because of the shape, right? The top is bigger than the bottom. The top would be, you know, those are where all your new leads come in. So let's say you got 200 um, you know, prospects that go in the top of the funnel. And as you work through your prospecting phases of your cold outreach and your email follow-up and your continuous um phone calls and whatnot, then you get the ones that move down to the middle of your funnel, right? You've talked to somebody, you've had some sort of qualification that's gone through there. They're not committing to bringing you in, but you've been able to establish some kind of rapport. Those folks have made it down there, and maybe you've refilled the top with another another hundred new ones. And then as you get to the bottom of that funnel, and this is where we say use different stages in your CRM to kind of tag where is this prospect at? Are they new? Are they qualified? Are we, you know, are we in the bidding process or are they a full-blown customer? You get down, maybe you've got like seven or eight that you're having regular conversations with about um volumes that they're doing, and and maybe you're sending some quotes over and whatnot. And then at the bottom comes out your actual customers, right? And like you said, that entire long conversation, right? If it, if it's linear in a pipeline, it goes vertically in a in a um sales funnel. They're both basically the same thing. One is just a visual of of how it shrinks down the number of prospects as it gets towards the end of that sales funnel versus the linear motion. But you're right, it's like one big conversation, and um that's a great way. Like people are always like, well, what should I follow up about? Right. And it's you shouldn't just say, oh, I just want to touch base or just check in with you, right? It's what is what was your note about, right? What was the last thing you talked about? What's like a good key bullet point to bring up in the next conversation? And it could be, like you said, how was the birthday party? How about this lane? How about X, Y, and Z other things that I wrote down on my CRN? Or like I said before, they mention an upcoming bid cycle, or maybe a new distributor or vendor that's gonna be involved, or a new project or you know, facility that's gonna be opened up. Whatever that is, is gonna be different for just about every customer. Like if I talk to a company that's got tariff issues right now, it's gonna be a different follow-up than someone who's um you know shipping citrus in the spring. Like it's just they're just two totally different kinds of companies. Now, if you have similar, you know, we talk about prosper with a purpose, right? If if if everyone that you're calling today has something in common, which is an upcoming bid cycle, yeah, your follow-ups could sound very similar. Or if they're all you know, fill-in-a-blank produce that's gonna start shipping in two months, you could have that same similar follow-up conversation. Um but yeah, having notes, again, you're not gonna have that detail in organization in Excel sheet.

SPEAKER_00: 49:37

Here's the other thing that is hard to do in Excel, which is like I and I have these fields when I set up a CRM too, is like, who is the main point of contact or decision maker? Okay, because I want to know who that person is, not just to get onboarded, but if I own a brokerage, I want to be able to do quarterly reviews and reach out to that person, not every person at that company or guess who that person is. The other person I want to know is who are the people that tender freight to my brokerage? Because they're usually two different people in that shipper. And the third is like, who are the other people that tender freight at that shipper that aren't currently doing business with us? Because that's who I want my salespeople to keep following up with to build a relationship with. So most of that is never organized in anyone's CRM when I look at them. You can't really do it in Excel very well. And then the use case after that is active and inactive customers because you want to be going through every one of your active customers every quarter and following up with like the decision maker. Hey, can we do a quarterly review, see our on-time percentages, see if there's anything we could work on? Just wanted to do a review on how everything's been going. Then you want to be able to also go back and go, hey, this is a company we used to do a lot of business with, but is inactive because we haven't shipped with them in two months. Has anybody followed up with them? Most brokerages, like, once the shipper just doesn't send them any more quotes for a while, everybody just forgets. And like, you did all this work to get onboarded, did business with them, ran three loads, then just got busy and completely forgot about it. And the reality is like, that's the easiest company to go back and reactivate because you're already onboarded. You just forgot to talk to them because you got busy with something else, right? Yep. And all of that is very difficult to manage unless you can sort it in a database to go, these are active. These used to be active, but this long ago. And these are the people we need to follow up with. These are the people that we could work with, but aren't yet, and we need to keep talking to. And all of that stuff is way easier to execute on when it's all in one place and everybody in the company can see it.

SPEAKER_01: 51:45

Agreed. And I wanna I wanna kind of put a bow on it with this is that one of my best pieces of advice when it comes to a CRM is use it for every single call, regardless of the outcome. And don't get lazy. And let's say you make the call and you're in the car, like someone calls you and you're in the car. Well, as soon as you like can pull over whatnot, like just shoot yourself an email with the notes and add it to your CRM later, right? Like, and the reason I say that is if you don't log a, you know, a call that didn't get answered, or a voicemail that you left, or a text you sent, or whatever the case might be, you don't have the full picture going into that next call. So whether you're brand new and just getting into this, or maybe you're training someone on your team, that is like a a rule of thumb that I always say is log literally everything that you can. And one of the great things about a lot of the CRMs now is um they with AI AI built-in and automation now, like I can go into HubSpot, pull up a contact, hit the summary button, and it reads the entire thread of all my calls, log text, emails, etc. And it gives me a quick here's the situation going on here, right? Um, just it's the same way that like I would say log every carrier call that you can like get something out of the phone call of the carrier, whether or not you load them or not. Um, find out, you know, how much uh what kind of equipment they have, their preferred lanes, whatever you can, because that data is ultimately gonna be a huge game changer for you.

SPEAKER_00: 53:16

Um I have it set up too where like video calls, like they get recorded and summarized and dumped right into my CRM. So I don't even have to take notes if we do a video call. Like that just automatically goes in there. But the last thing I wanted to share is I built like a template for a client which has like, I think like a pretty good list of questions you want to know about every prospect or customer. Because to the follow-up question we always get, like literally, if you go into their CRM and you go to log a call, you can just press a button and it pulls up a whole list of these questions that I uploaded and you can just fill it in. So like you can see where you got to. So as soon as you get into the next call, you have your notes, but you can just pick up and have questions to ask without having to remember them. And we have these on our website, a lot of them, but I did like a summary of ones I thought like were super important and a shorter list. And it's just customer discovery questions. Number one, points of contact. Who are the points of contact for each of your locations? Do you have any other locations that you guys ship out of that I'm unaware of? Order process. When do you typically receive customer orders? How much lead time do you have between receiving a truckload order and needing to ship it? Do you receive orders daily or weekly? On which days of the week? When do you typically consolidate or put orders together for the next week? Do you manage freight through a portal or email? If using a portal, is it a water style waterfall style allocation or is it price-based? Does the portal consider both price and service performance? If one or the other, or both, how do you weight them? RFPs. Do you have an RFP? If so, when, how often, quarterly, annually? Shipping lane details. Are your shipments customer-facing or plant-to-plant? Are they inbound, raw materials, outbound, finished goods, both? Who's responsible for arranging inbound? Who's responsible for arranging outbound? Do you ever ship over the weekend? Pickups or deliveries? What are your most frequently run lanes? Which lanes do you use less frequently? Have any lanes had a higher rate of service failures or having difficulty finding trucks for? And then seasonality and volume trends. When are your busiest times of year? When are your slowest periods? What are your average weekly volumes in the busiest or slowest period? How is your current shipping volume compared to this time last year? What volume do you expect next week, next month, next quarter? How do this year's sales or volumes compare to last year's? So they're like specific enough that they're helpful, but general enough that you can kind of weave them into a conversation without seeming like you're interrogating somebody to understand like how and what they're doing.

SPEAKER_01: 56:06

Yep. I had um I got a few other ones on my on my notes here. Um so like personal stuff, like kids, yeah, their favorite sports team, what kind of personality are they, past job history. Um like those are ones to me that can be very good icebreaker conversation starters. And there's I mean, we've said this a million times, but like this time of year, like if you're if your prospect likes football, you have something to say every, like almost every day of the week. Like every day. Thursday, you get football. Friday, you got to go to the floor.

SPEAKER_00: 56:39

Thursday night football, Monday night football. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01: 56:42

Monday, you had last weekend's games, Tuesday, you had Monday night football. Um, so I and you know, fill in the blank on the different sport, like if it's hockey or basketball, it's like every day. Obviously, there's something going on.

SPEAKER_00: 56:55

So and here's the thing: I I did this for some folks that were asking, like, how this kind of works in the US versus like overseas. I'm like, I don't need to know everything about what someone's interested in. I just need enough to ask questions. So, like, if I was doing business in, I don't know, India, and cricket is the most prevalent sport there, like I'm just gonna ask, like, hey, do you follow cricket? That goes in my CRM. So the next time I go to talk to you, I'm just gonna look up where you're at, who your local team is, and who they played last and who they played next. And like, that is enough for me to get you to talk about it. Hey, how was the game against so-and-so? Looks like you guys, it was a pretty close one. That's gonna get you to tell me a lot. What are your thoughts about the upcoming team? I'm looking at who it is. That's gonna get you to talk to me for another five, 10 minutes. I like those are super simple things that like I don't need to follow NFL if I don't know anything about it. I don't need to follow NBA. I just need to know you do, remind myself and look up who your team was, who you played last, and who you play next. And that is enough to get you to probably talk for 15 minutes.

SPEAKER_01: 58:00

I had a guy, this is literally last week. It's funny you brought that up. And so he's from Boston, like a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts. So I was like, hey man, like, how about your Patriots this year? And he's like, What? And I'm like the New England Patriots. He's like, I don't I don't follow. I'm like your football team. He's like, Oh, he's like, I don't follow football at all. He's like, I'm a huge boxing guy. And I was like, Oh, okay. I was like, what do you think about Tyson versus Jake Paul? Yeah, like just quick pivot, but like, yeah, not everybody stuff that you like.

SPEAKER_00: 58:27

Yeah, and like you don't have to assume, like as long as you just ask an open-ended question, like, yeah, hey, out of curiosity, you a sports fan at all? Who do you follow any of your local teams up there? No, I'm a boxing fan. Like, in 30 seconds, I could find out the next heavyweight match that's coming up and the last one, and just go like, hey, did you catch the last fight? What did you think?

SPEAKER_01: 58:46

Or if you don't know anything about that sport, ask them. Because if they love it, they're gonna talk about it.

SPEAKER_00: 58:54

Yeah, that's the whole point. And it could be a lot of people. I don't need to know shit about it.

SPEAKER_01: 58:57

Correct. I had a guy that was like um, so it they shipped uh like small recreational sailboats, okay? And he was big, like big fan of like like talking like on a on a lake, like a like a Hobie type deal. Yeah. And I like I did that when I was like a kid at like summer camp, but as an adult, like not like an expertise of mine, but like I just pick his brain on it. And like that was just have to be curious. They're passionate about it and they're selling them and chipping them, like they're gonna they they love to talk about it. So the same thing goes with like some people and their pets. Like, there are some people that just love their dogs and their cats like beyond um fathomable, in my opinion. But uh, yeah, I mean, you can go down down a rabbit hole.

SPEAKER_00: 59:43

No joke. I was training somebody to do this the one time, and I've always joked and used this as an example of like basket weaving, right? But literally, the prospect he was talking to was he asked like, oh hey, like, you know, do you have any hobbies? And this woman was like really into, I don't know if it was like literal basket weaving, but like crochet and needlepoint or whatever. And he he on our next coaching call, he goes, like, I'm not really sure what to ask. I go, dude, just like go to GPT and say, like, what are some interesting questions I could ask for somebody with this hobby? And it gave him like five questions, right? His next call was like 45 minutes long. This woman talked, the I heard the recording like the entire time, telling him everything she's excited about in that industry. Her mom was super into it. They might start a side business that is in this industry. And like, the point is like, you don't need to share that interest. You don't need to know anything about it. You just to your point to be curious, and then listen. Yeah. Like, yeah, hey, that's super interesting. I've never, never heard about that. Don't really know anyone does it. Like, how did you get into it? How do you do that? Where do you get your supplies from? What made you interested in it? Right. Like, just be curious. Like, that's the whole point. Like, people like who always tosses like, oh, well, I don't know anything about this. I'm like, yeah, it's even easier when you don't know shit about it. Because you actually have questions to ask.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:06

And there's all, I mean, again, it could be a ton of stuff. I had I talked to a guy yesterday that he made a comment, he's like, Man, my kids are getting old and I'm I'm going bald. And I was like, Oh, how old are your kids? And he's like, Oh, they're six and two. And I was like, I'm like, I I have a five, a four, and a one, and I would consider them young. Um, but it's all perspective, right? But then when I told him, like, oh yeah, I got, I've got, you know, three young ones myself, now it's like, boom, we we can we can naturally relate on, you know, the sleepless nights, the chaos in a household. Like, it's it's uh there's so many ways to connect with people. And a big takeaway here is people will remember how you make them feel when they get off the phone with you, right? Like it and you know, that rapport is priceless. Like you can't, it's such a subjective thing, right? Because you could say, uh, we could oh, we do everything, white glove and full truckload LTL International, and you know, we have the best rates and blah, blah, blah. But at the end of the day, like, does someone is someone gonna want to spend their time doing business with you? Like, are they gonna feel connected with you and you know make their job feel more enjoyable? And that's what these conversations will help you do. So make sure you log it all in your CRM.

SPEAKER_00: 1:02:22

And I want to put put one last thing in of like where this can go too far and wrong, and why it's I think better to just be curious and not actually know about it, is because like I've been in conversations where like someone has that interest and I actually have it, but like I ended up reading like a book recently about it. And someone's like super excited to share with me what they've learned. And I've been like, oh yeah, like I just finished this book on this, and then I start telling them because I'm excited about it, what I read. And then they feel like intimidated because like I either shared what they were just gonna tell me or said something that like they didn't know, and then they feel like, well, I'm not gonna tell you what I was gonna tell you now because I feel like you already know it. And then the conversation dies. Yeah. And like I've literally had that. And so it's like just being curious and open is honestly most often better than like immediately telling somebody else everything you know about what they're interested in, because then the whole point is like they want to talk to you about it and to tell you what they know. They're not really interested in you telling them what you know about it in most cases.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:31

Yeah, exactly. Good stuff, good conversation. Let us know what you guys think. And um, if you got any cool, unique prospecting questions or stories, put them in the comments or send them our way in our contact form, and we'll make sure to share them. But final thoughts, Ben.

SPEAKER_00: 1:03:48

Whether you believe you can or believe you can't, you're right.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:52

And until next time, go bills.