As experts in the freight factoring industry, Transportation Management Group is passionate about giving you the financial help and industry insights to help your freight business grow—it’s been our mission for almost 20 years.

In this blog, we’ll discuss some of the best practices that lead to a successful trucking business so your company can reach its full potential.

Invest in quality equipment.

Spending money on quality freight equipment like trucks and storage facilities is the first and most expensive purchase you’ll make as you build your freight outfit. It can be daunting to spend this kind of money upfront without any guarantee of financial returns, but it’s essential if you’re trying to get in the business.

A number of new freight companies will attempt to save a little money upfront by purchasing lower quality or used equipment, but this strategy backfires more often than not. Used equipment will ultimately need more repairs—unexpected expenses that can destroy your operational budget.

Spending more money upfront might sting at first, but you’ll have strong, dependable, and predictable equipment for years to come, which will make your expenses more predictable as well.

Understand your expenses.

When it comes to running a freight business, understanding your expenses is the ultimate key to success. You must be able to predict and manage the costs of maintenance and repairs, fuel, operational expenses, and employee wages while creating enough income from freight jobs to make a profit of some sort. Ideally, you’d also have some sort of reserve fund to handle any unexpected or emergency expenses.

With this in mind, it’s important to bid for freight jobs in a way that is competitive with the market but won’t put your budget in the red over time. As a new freight company, this can be a test of patience—it’s easy to feel like you must shortchange yourself by bidding aggressively to grow your customer base. But with some patience in the bidding game, you’ll find customers that are just right for your business and your budget.

In our previous blog, we discussed a few helpful tips that can grow your freight business. We’ll give you even more tips for business growth and smooth operations, here.

Run an efficient business.

Easier said than done, right? It’s hard to pin down the right methods and processes by which to run your freight business. Not all freight businesses work alike—every job, truck, and sect of management has a different way of organizing their team and their assets. The key is to be aware of your business processes and have a constant desire to improve your processes.

In the freight business (and pretty much all businesses) time is money—you don’t want to spend an unnecessary amount of time on logistics when you could be out completing jobs and making money.

One of the best ways to improve the efficiency of your freight business is to utilize professional freight management software. These software programs can help you keep track of expenses, delivery schedules, maintenance logs, and anything else you might need for an organized freight business.

It’s also important to make sure that your processes are consistent across your entire company, ensuring that everyone on your team is working at their peak efficiency.

Business efficiency is just as much about creativity as it is about organization. By finding unique ways to make your business faster and more efficient, you’ll accelerate your business growth, and perhaps find ways to gain an edge on your competition.

Solve your cash flow issues.

Almost every freight business faces problems with cash flow at one point or another. While cash flow issues may not sink your business, they can certainly affect the positive growth rate of your business, and prevent you from taking on bigger, better jobs.

For truckers, the most common cause for cash flow issues comes in the form of late and delayed payments. If you’re in the freight business, you’ll understand that every payment comes in the day after you really need it. This is frustrating for drivers, managers, and freight company owners, and can affect the overall morale of a freight business.

If you’re trying to rapidly expand your freight business by adding new trucks to your fleet and customers to your portfolio, it’s easy for expenses to outweigh your revenue—especially when you have several “pending” invoices leaving you payment purgatory.

To solve this nearly universal freight industry issue, you need cash advances that allow you to get the money you need without the wait, allowing you to advance your business growth at the pace you desire.

Choose Transportation Management Group

With Transportation Management Group, your freight company can get the money it needs when it needs it the most. We offer industry-leading freight factoring services, high advances on low rates, and guaranteed fuel credit lines to keep your business moving forward, even if your invoices aren’t.

With 20 years of industry experience, Transportation Management Group can help you with all of your freight factoring needs. Contact us today!