By Mack Greene
Communication automation and technology has become quintessential across nearly every industry to keep up with employee and customer preferences in the digital age. Implementing these technology solutions in older, more established industries can not only be incredibly satisfying, but also exponentially beneficial to that industry’s evolution.
For trucking and transit companies, communicating effectively with their fleet during transit is a crucial facet of the business when it comes to overall safety and efficiency—ultimately affecting a company’s revenue. Thanks to emerging technologies such as Communications Platforms as a Service (CPaaS), modernizing the process can be relatively easy and can produce quick and tangible results for every party involved. IntelePeer, a leading CPaaS provider, has helped many fleet customers in the trucking and transit industries increase safety, revenue, efficiencies, and overall productivity through revamping communications systems at their core.
SMOOTHER COMMUNICATIONS
With its rich history and legacy, the trucking and transit industry has no trouble proving that their current and past processes and technology work well. Although a complete digital transformation might not seem realistic for every fleet, a communications automated solution is a strategic first step.
We’ve been able to bring some newer, more advanced technologies to bear for this industry that aren’t in wide scale user adoption right now, predominantly techniques to help automate, via voice, interactions that a trucking or transit driver would have with the back office. When dealing with a workforce with a higher turnover rate, it is strategic to simplify just about every process involved, but it becomes especially important when it comes to central communication with drivers.
Simplicity and safety go hand in hand, and the ability to seamlessly report issues to the home office using just your voice is crucial when drivers are on the road. Whether it’s something as routine as getting a location for the next pickup, or something more pressing like a vehicle breakdown or accident, ease of use is key. With IntelePeer’s voice automation technology, drivers can both send and receive important information without ever taking their eyes off the road, let alone having to pull over.
PEACE OF MIND
For trucking and transit companies implementing voice automation, on-road safety and convenience are just the beginning of the benefits that this solution can provide. When the back office adopts technology allowing for a simplified two-way communication, that information can be used to create long-term improvements and efficiencies in the company’s overall service.
A typical support system for truck drivers isn’t unlike the ones most consumers are familiar with when talking to customer service. Drivers are forced to dial in, navigate a menu where they’re asked to press numbers corresponding to the service they need, and then hope they’ll be in touch with a human being that can solve their problem. Using artificial intelligence and voice automation solutions like IntelePeer’s Atmosphere, brings some real intelligence to the communication process. Fleet drivers can simply describe whatever challenges they might be having at that moment, and the AI system can effectively pre-interview them before routing them to the appropriate back office contact person. This type of intelligence-based, voice-driven solution has proven to be a key upgrade because it reduces the amount of time employees spend interacting with the call system and cuts down the individual call time on the back-office end, ensuring time is more efficiently and effectively spent.
DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION
When it comes to getting companies and industries to adopt new automation solutions, there is often an innate fear of change. However, when considering a new technology, businesses should think like such, and focus on the core purpose of the decision—return on investments. Some of those results may show up as soft dollars—a more efficient system creates happier, safer employees—but there are more than enough tangible hard-dollar benefits to justify quick and comprehensive adoption of these technologies.
First, the actual cost of implementation can be relatively low with communications platforms such as IntelePeer, because the platform can be built almost entirely on top of a company’s existing communication infrastructure. Once it’s in place, companies can expect to see a significant reduction in the amount of labor needed to fulfill drivers’ requests, and in many cases, live agents can be removed from the initial process altogether, allowing their skills and experience to be focused on more important tasks for the business’s high-value clients. This creates a relatively fast return on a relatively small investment—an ideal scenario for any company, but especially for those that might be in a growth phase.
As with any migration to some new platform, technological or otherwise, the goal is to see an improvement, and when a company starts to stack up all of the benefits of voice automation, it’s fairly easy to see the potential for growth in result. When you run a safer fleet, you spend less on insurance and repairs. When your employees are happier, the ones that help your business run better stay longer. And when your business runs better, your happier customers will stay longer too—and spend more on your services.
CLOSING THOUGHT
In the trucking and transit industry, striking the balance between safety and efficiency essentially is the core of the business model. Using voice automation, truckers can keep their eyes on the road while their counterparts in the back office keep their eyes on the prize.
About The Author
Mack Greene is director of custom engineering for IntelePeer. IntelePeer powers the new customer experience with Atmosphereˇ CPaaS, which enables companies to communicate better–driving more revenue, improving the customer experience, and making better business decisions–leveraging omni-channel Automation & Self-Service, AI, and Analytics, all delivered through a single easy-to-use cloud platform that works seamlessly with your existing business. For more, visit intelepeer.com.
Modern Contractor Solutions, May 2021
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