As the end of the year comes to a close, growth is on almost every brokerage’s mind. But, growing sustainably means working with the right shippers that you can build rapport and long-term relationships with. By choosing the right shippers for your brokerage from the beginning, you can set yourself up for growth in 2025 and beyond.
Let’s look at some questions to ask to ensure the shippers you work with are the right ones for your business. Working with the right customers is the key to successful freight broker sales.
Do Your Research Ahead of Time
Before we dive into the questions to ask your shippers to qualify them, we first need to talk about the importance of good prospecting from the beginning.
Freight broker prospecting is a lot like digging for gold. Before you start digging a 12-foot hole, you want to be sure there’s gold at the end. As a broker, your biggest asset is time. By doing your research ahead of time, you ensure that your time isn’t wasted and that the shipper you’re potentially going to work with is a good fit for your business.
Research Their Business
Before getting on a freight broker sales call with a shipper, take the time to research their business. This includes their industry, business size, geographic locations, any recent news, and freight types. You can also estimate their current shipping volume based on public data, testimonials, or industry standards.
Identify Key Contacts
To make the most of your calls, make sure you’re talking to key decision-makers at the company. Tools like LinkedIn can help you identify these key contacts.
Leverage Existing Relationships
In addition to knowing the key contacts, research if you have any mutual connections. These mutual connections can help bridge the gap between the first freight broker sales call and building rapport.
Go the Extra Mile
As Chris Brewer, CEO of River City Logistics says, “the battle is won before the phone call.” This means preparing as much as possible so you know who you’re talking to and what their needs are. He suggests going the extra mile and researching if you have any other things in common. This like mutual hobbies might seem superficial, but they can go a long way in building a connection with a prospect.
Qualifying Questions to Ask Your Shippers
Okay, so you’ve done your research and know that the shipper you’re talking to is worth a discovery call. Let’s go over the types of questions to ask as you qualify shippers as part of your freight broker sales process.
Questions About Their Past Experience
Qualifying questions help you assess whether a shipper is a good fit for your services. Here are some categories of qualifying questions to start with:
Past Experience With Brokers
A great freight broker prospecting question to ask potential new customers is whether or not they’ve worked with a brokerage before. This will give you a good understanding of what to expect and may give you insight into their past experience and how working with your brokerage might compare.
Seasonal Volumes
Asking volume-related questions is an important way to qualify shippers. While some shippers might be hesitant to answer specific questions like “how much are you shipping this week?”, they may be more open to general questions about past loads. For example, try asking things like “what volumes were you averaging last fall? What about last summer? Were those volumes more or less than expected?”
By keeping volume-related questions conversational and focused on past experiences, you can get a good gauge on how much business this shipper might bring your brokerage.
Load Type
Of course, you need to make sure that the load type matches your brokerage. Ask questions about whether they require any special equipment for their loads, if they do full truckload shipping or LTL, and any other load-specific questions you need to know.
Business-Related Questions
Next, ask the shipper about their specific business. Remember, the purpose of the discovery call in your freight broker sales process is to get as much information as possible to see if they’re a good fit for your brokerage.
These business-related questions will depend on the specific shipper but might include things like “how has your year been?”, “how is your industry doing?”, or “are you expecting any big orders this year?” Try to keep it positive and encourage the shipper to share their successes.
Operational Questions
Lastly, you should qualify your shippers by asking operational questions so you fully understand their business and needs. These freight broker sales questions can cover everything from their internal organization structure to their weekly truckload shipments. Here are some operational questions to help get you started:
- How is your shipping organized?
- How much notice do you usually get to organize a truck to pick up your load?
- When is your busy season? When is your slow season?
- How do you usually find your trucks?
- How much time do you spend organizing a truck pickup on a last-minute load?
- What kind of trucks or equipment do you require?
- Have you had to extend freight payment terms and why?
- How many locations do you have? Are you organizing both inbound and outbound shipments from these locations?
These operational questions just scratch the surface of everything you can ask about a shipper’s operations so let the conversation guide your information-gathering. Remember, you’re interviewing your shipper to see if they’re a good fit for your business as much as they’re interviewing you to see if they want to work with you.
Bonus: The Magic Wand Question
Even the most successful shippers likely have something they would change about their business. But, rather than focus on the negative, consider asking the Magic Wand question: “if you had a magic wand and could change anything about your business, what would it be?” This is a fun and positive way to discuss potential challenges and pain points. It will also give you insight on what you can help improve as the shipper’s freight brokerage.
Find High-Quality Shippers Through Research, Prospecting, and Asking the Right Questions
2025 is right around the corner, which means now’s the time to set your brokerage up for success to start the new year strong. One powerful end-of-year goal is to focus on attracting high-quality shippers to increase your freight broker sales. By doing your research and qualifying your prospects by asking the right questions, you can foster trust and secure partnerships with the right shippers.
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