North Star/iVerify combines the carrier's actual routes, customers, equipment, schedules, and operating constraints with freight corridors, industrial facilities, logistics infrastructure, and customer locations to identify where a targeted sales effort may make sense.
Start with the carrier's actual operation
A carrier should not chase every possible customer or every lane that appears busy. The starting point is the carrier's own operation.
North Star/iVerify can organize and compare:
- current routes and lanes;
- customer and delivery locations;
- origin and destination patterns;
- equipment type;
- driver schedules;
- home-time requirements;
- available capacity;
- operating limitations;
- markets the carrier already understands.
The objective is to define where the carrier can operate reliably and where additional freight may improve the network rather than disrupt it.
Identify freight-generating locations
North Star/iVerify can search and organize freight activity by:
- radius around a terminal, city, interchange, customer, or operating location;
- named company;
- named warehouse, plant, distribution center, terminal, or industrial facility;
- freight corridor or highway route;
- market, region, lane, or customer concentration.
The research may include:
- warehouses;
- distribution centers;
- manufacturing plants;
- ports;
- rail facilities;
- intermodal terminals;
- bulk terminals;
- logistics parks;
- industrial districts;
- major shippers;
- other freight-generating locations.
The purpose is not to create a long unqualified list. The purpose is to identify locations and companies that may fit the carrier's existing lanes, equipment, capacity, and service requirements.
Match the opportunity to the carrier
A promising customer is not simply a business located near a highway.
The opportunity should be compared against:
- the carrier's current freight network;
- likely inbound and outbound balance;
- equipment requirements;
- route compatibility;
- driver availability;
- service commitments;
- home-time effects;
- operating distance;
- customer concentration;
- practical sales access.
North Star/iVerify can help organize these factors so the carrier can distinguish a rational prospect from a name on a list.
Carrier operating footprint → freight-generating locations → corridor and lane fit → prioritized prospect list
Compare corridors and market position
A freight opportunity may depend on how several routes, customers, facilities, and operating patterns come together. North Star/iVerify can compare corridor convergence, route frequency, traffic and truck movement, access to industrial and logistics centers, proximity to major freight markets, relay or interchange potential, customer clusters, and competing and complementary transportation activity.
This diagram is an example of North Star/iVerify's corridor-convergence analysis from a separate project. It illustrates the method, not a claim about any specific carrier's markets.
Prepare a practical sales effort
North Star/iVerify may help organize a qualified prospect list, facility and company research, route and market maps, customer-location summaries, carrier-specific sales materials, presentation graphics, outreach priorities, and a record of who was contacted and why the prospect was selected.
Professional Human Resources and North Star may support the research and organization, but the carrier remains responsible for pricing, capacity, customer qualification, service commitments, operating decisions, contracts, and direct sales activity.
This graphic is an example of how North Star organizes operating criteria and data into a structured framework on a separate project -- shown here to illustrate the method.
Better information can make the sales effort more focused.
North Star/iVerify helps organize the carrier's operating information and outside freight intelligence so the carrier can decide where a targeted customer-development effort may be justified.
Discuss a Freight and Customer Review →