The adoption of technology and automation in the freight industry has followed a clear evolutionary path. Around ten years ago, we saw the emergence of driver-facing apps that allowed drivers to book loads, alongside the rise of real-time tracking and visibility applications. These innovations brought new levels of connectivity and transparency to the movement of freight.

In more recent years, the focus shifted towards automating the rate coding process. This involved using technologies like bots and API connections to automate interactions with spot portals and handle email quotes. While this automation brought efficiencies to the sales side, helping companies win loads, it also contributed to a market environment where margins became “pretty tight”.

Amidst this technological progression, one critical operational area remained largely untouched by widespread automation: appointment scheduling. Despite customers actively inquiring about solutions to streamline appointment scheduling, the market offered very little. Existing solutions that attempted to automate scheduling often relied on basic RPA or bots. These methods proved problematic – they could be “slow,” “confusing,” would frequently “freeze up,” and required manual restarts. This made them unreliable and not a truly effective solution for a process so critical to timely freight movement.

Because of this gap and the limitations of earlier approaches, appointment scheduling is now viewed as “the next wave of automation”. There’s a growing recognition that operational efficiency and speed in scheduling are paramount. The drive is towards streamlining operations to “get faster” and to consistently secure “better appointments”.

Brokerages are increasingly understanding that improving operational speed and efficiency, particularly in scheduling, will not only “help their their margins” but also “improve their relationships with their customers”. Delays and issues with appointments directly impact carriers, facilities, and ultimately the shipper. Efficient scheduling mitigates these problems.

The source notes the excitement around companies leading the charge in this relatively underdeveloped space. Specifically, it mentions Bigger Picture as leading scheduling automation and doing so in a “different way”. Unlike other platforms or solutions that might be “siloed off,” a key need in scheduling is integrating with the diverse methods used by facilities – the different scheduling portals and the prevalence of email requests. A solution that can unify these fragmented communication methods into “one platform integrated with all the other scheduling portals” is seen as addressing a core challenge. This integrated approach is necessary for the next wave of automation in freight scheduling to truly succeed.