How to manage multiple third-party logistics partners?

Be it manufacturing, retail, FMCG, or e-commerce, achieving customer satisfaction is the prime goal of every business. To do so, businesses focus on providing high quality products at the most competitive price. But that’s not just enough; another business segment that needs undivided attention is Logistics. Poor logistics operations can lead to delayed deliveries, increased rate of RTO, and many other problems.

In short, the logistics segment of a business needs to be managed in a way to smooth the complete order delivery process. However, not every business can manage to hire a dedicated team for that. Therefore, they choose to hire third-party logistics partners or 3PL providers for this purpose. Businesses also hire 3PL partners during peak sale seasons when the demand is high and the logistics team find it difficult to process huge orders.

But hiring a third-party logistics partner is not a cakewalk; you have to consider multiple factors like regions they cater to, type of fleet they own, whether they have proper warehouses or not, and others. Once you hire, the next thing is to manage their operations to ensure complete satisfaction of your end-customers. Hiring a separate team to look after 3PL partners associated with your company is not a good choice. Rather, what you can do is to rely on tech-enabled platforms such as a 3PL aggregator for the same.

What is a 3PL aggregator?

To understand the 3PL aggregator platform, let’s take an example. You use Zomato, Foodpanda, and other such platforms for ordering food from multiple restaurants and food joints. These platforms are an aggregator that facilitate online food ordering. Similarly, a 3PL aggregator platform is a place that allows managing multiple third-party logistics partners.

What can you manage through a 3PL aggregator platform?

A third-party aggregator platform, mainly the one offered by Shipsy, comes up with top-notch features to help businesses to manage the following:

Automatic order allocation to the right delivery partner

The platform follows pre-defined allocation rules to ensure that a consignment gets allocated to the right 3PL provider. For example- if you have to deliver frozen items, then it will choose the logistics partners that facilitates the delivery of the same. You don’t even need to intervene in the process.

Unified tracking through tracking APIs

A 3PL aggregator platform allows you to track all your delivery partners from a single dashboard. From consignment pick up to its final delivery, you can track everything in real-time. This helps in figuring out the delay in deliveries and the other delivery-related problems.

Measuring the performance of multiple 3PLs

With the third-party logistics aggregator platform, you can look into the delivery-related feedback submitted by the customers. These feedbacks would help you to find out which 3PL company is doing better in terms of order delivery. Besides, you can also check the total number of successful, failed, and delayed deliveries from each of the 3PL companies. Based on the data, you can figure out which is the best 3PL company for your organization.

 Visibility to the end-customers

Maintaining transparency with the customers by providing better consignment visibility helps in achieving customer satisfaction. Moreover, it also reduces the number of calls to your customer support center and the rate of RTO (return to origin). The 3PL aggregator platform provides you direct access to customers’ feedback, their complaints, and requests on the order delivery.

So, ditch your traditional ways of 3PL management and switch to Shipsy’s 3PL aggregator platform now. Besides delighting your customers, the platform would also help you to save on the overall logistics costs.