Increasing revenue and completing more deliveries lies in advanced and automated planning.
Routing and scheduling software options like OptimoRoute can make adjustments before and after your drivers leave, which can boost delivery efficiency in the face of the unexpected.
Let’s say you have a route planned for the day; however, when the driver leaves, a new pickup needs to be scheduled. A routing and scheduling software will automatically adjust for the new delivery. When choosing a routing option, make sure to pick one that provides real-time updating for each driver to achieve the highest delivery efficiency possible.
During a busy week, some orders might have to be delayed. So, delivery efficiency, in this case, means looking at which orders will impact your business the most and ensuring that those are completed first. Focus on priority orders to increase revenue and reduce impact when all tasks might not be completed.
Look at importance based on what delivery needs to be delivered first. For instance, if you are picking up and delivering frozen goods without a cooling truck, prioritize those deliveries to make sure they are not spoiling.
Leave less important deliveries till the end of the day after all the most important orders to make sure your delivery schedule is optimized for the worst-case scenario.
Advanced scheduling helps you plan for high and low customer demand ahead of time rather than at the last minute. This can reduce the risk of major last-minute changes resulting in a driver shortage (or excess, which costs you money). Use the knowledge you have on upcoming orders to optimize the drivers’ schedules for the upcoming month.
For example, if you plan now for the deliveries, you know you’ll have in the following month, you’ll have time to hire a new driver. On the other hand, if you wait until the last minute to schedule all your deliveries, you could be short-staffed and unable to complete your jobs.
When scheduling deliveries in advance, make sure to leave room for new orders while maintaining estimated workloads weeks in advance for the best results.
You can increase efficiency if you optimize drivers’ lunches and breaks. When you don’t plan for driver breaks, and then drivers take them, you create the illusion of missed time or quotas when, in reality, the schedule you created wasn’t possible.
For example, proper planning might have your driver scheduled for a 30-minute break near popular lunch spots after all the important deliveries have taken place. Without that planning, your driver might need to go out of their way to find lunch, causing important deliveries to be delayed. Plan ahead to monitor your delivery efficiency realistically rather than see missed quotas and potentially misinterpret the reasons.
Look at important driver performance metrics like delivery speed over time to find new places for delivery efficiency improvement. Optimizing your drivers’ schedules and perfecting your delivery efficiency isn’t a one-time task. Rather, delivery route planning and schedule optimization require ongoing evaluation of performance metrics because routes and packages (and sometimes drivers) change regularly.
Let’s say you spend a week implementing these tips and optimizing your routing procedures. A month later, you notice one driver always takes longer. In this case, you can look and see what’s delaying them compared to the other drivers—further improving delivery efficiency.
Use routing and scheduling software that allows for performance metrics so that you can find potential areas for improvement.
Show your customers when they should expect their package using a proof of delivery template or through live delivery notifications. Using proof of delivery increases customer experience in the face of missed deadlines or delays. Let’s face it, no matter how much you increase your delivery efficiency, delays and missed deliveries will happen. Track everything and create transparency to save time and increase customer satisfaction and trust.
If you are transparent, you don’t have to waste time making excuses as to why there were delays. This increases customer trust as well since they know you’ll tell the truth no matter what happens. Delivery tracking should be live, and one option is to show them how many stops away the driver is from their home and the expected delivery time. Finally, proof of delivery can be electronic, even including a photo of the package at the customer’s home.
