Apart from finance, a lot about the national and global economy revolves around transportation. In the event of a breakdown of transportation or any transportation infrastructure, this will have a very devastating effect on the global economy. Imagine if a train station is shut down or an airport terminal is shut down, global economic activities will grind to a halt. This is how important transportation is.
Having talked about how important transportation is, it then becomes necessary to know that there is a need to maintain the transportation system and ensure that it functions and runs hitch free. This takes us to transportation management. The transportation industry has grown to be a huge industry on its own.
As a manufacturing enterprise, you understand the importance of having your goods and products moved from one point to another, continent to continent. To successfully carry this out requires the use and support of transportation management and a transportation management system. This has accounted for the growth of the transportation management industry which is now in the value of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Transportation management system plays a lot of role in the business and operational activities of retailers and the retail industry. Also, apart from manufacturing and retail, a transportation management system is also crucial in logistics and e-commerce. In fact, logistics is part of the transportation management system.
Understanding Transportation Management System Licensing Arrangements
There are licensing arrangements which are available for transportation management and trucking companies that want to deploy a transportation management system for their operations. For licensing arrangements for transportation management systems, there are four of them. But three are most commonly used.
The three most commonly used transportation management systems are; On Premises, Hybrid and Hosted transportation management system licensing arrangements.
- On-Premises: This is the most commonly used transportation management system. It is also relatively easy to deploy. This is also the very traditional model of the transportation management system and involves the transportation company buying the on-premises transportation management system software license which it then deploys on its servers. This is why the name ‘on premises’ is given.
The on-premises transportation management system is mostly used because of the advantage of control which it affords transportation management companies. This control is mainly possible because the transportation management system software is deployed and hosted on the transportation or trucking company’s internal server
- Hosted: This type of transportation management system is presented as Software As A Service (SAAS) and is hosted in the cloud by a software company which administers and manages the system remotely for the transportation management company.
For example, Exspeedite provides a trucking software that is cloud-based and offering cutting edge technology in the transportation management system.
- Hybrid: While the on-premises and hosted transportation management system licensing arrangements are opposite models, the hybrid transportation management system is a combination of the on-premises and hosted licensing arrangements. This is so because the hybrid transportation management system affords the transportation management company the flexibility to customize the parameters of the transportation management system at a lower cost.
Of three transportation management systems discussed, the cloud-based transportation management systems are taking over. The leading transportation management systems today are cloud-based.
Challenges Of Transportation Management System
Despite being good and important, and in the era of technology, there are still many challenges which are facing the growth and development of the transportation management system. Some of these challenges have also made it not so easy to adopt and successfully implement the transportation management system.
Some of the challenges of the transportation management system include;
- Challenge Of Multiple Carriers
Due to how big the transportation management industry is, a lot of interests does exist with multiple companies providing different services. As a result, there are multiple carriers in the industry and each transportation management company choose a transportation management system that suits their business and operations.
This now makes it difficult to track shipments. For example, an e-commerce business that is moving goods across the country would employ the services of different trucking companies to move goods and shipments across the country.
As a result of these multiple carriers for all their freight, it becomes difficult to track shipments. This creates a challenge of having to input different shipment numbers on sites.
- Challenge Of Managing Quotes
Another challenge of the transportation management system is the challenge of managing quotes. This comes from the earlier challenge which we have discussed as the challenge of multiple carriers.
As a result of working with different transportation management systems, companies deal with multiple shipments and different quotes which brings up the challenge of managing and keeping the different quotes organized. The challenge also comes up more when you have to call up the different carriers to get quotes which are also rather time-consuming.
- Challenge Of Selecting The Best Carriers
From the myriad of available carriers, transportation companies have the challenge of selecting the best carriers. The best carrier which is the carrier that caters mostly to the need of your business. This is especially a problem because even though there are many carriers a few are worth any mention. But of the few that are worth any mention, one truly stands out. Exspeedite!
Also, when considering the fact that shipments are not born equal, different shipments come with different needs and specifics. All of these also being considered makes it a real challenge choosing the best carrier.
Exspeedite Transportation Management System Software
Among the several transportation management systems which we have now, Exspeedite’s TMS software has proven to be the best. Exspeedite is not just the best for the sake of it but for its outstanding and innovative cloud-based technology.
A lot of things stands Exspeedite out. With Exspeedite you get the competitive advantage to match the services of large trucking companies with innovative trucking software.
Also, with Exspeedite you can look up mileage quickly for point-to-point locations, plus create custom filters of your own that are displayed when filtering shipments. This gives you the true advantage of a transportation management system.
Conclusion
Transportation management systems have played a very great role in ensuring that the global economy stays afloat. In trying to maintain and keep the global economy running with the transportation infrastructure, transportation management and the transportation management system the role of technology have also been prominent and remarkable through the development and application of the software.
The licensing arrangements which are available for the transportation management system come in three main types which organizations can procure and deploy. They are on premises, hybrid and hosted transportation management systems.
Notwithstanding the transportation management system, there are still challenges which are part of the transportation management system today. These challenges include the challenge of choosing the best carrier, the challenge of managing multiple quotes from different carriers and so on.
Despite the challenges of the transportation management system today, one company’s transportation management system has been able to reduce these challenges to a very insignificant level through its innovative and up-to-date transportation management system. Exspeedite has proven to be the best choice transportation management system through its tracking software that has everything that any transportation management company needs to succeed and grow.
Author Bio: Scott Elliott
Scott Elliott, the CEO of Strong Tower and Exspeedite Trucking Software well embodies these great qualities. He currently sees to the affairs of the two companies whose progress rates baffle the mind. He has decided to use his experience as a businessman to better the lives of his very own folks.
