Who a freight broker is calling
A broker's or 3PL's sales reps call shippers: the companies that move freight, and the people there who decide who moves it. Titles depend on the company: logistics manager, transportation manager, supply chain director, shipping or warehouse manager, and at smaller manufacturers and distributors, the operations manager or the owner.
Those people run the dock. Their day is late trucks, loads that need covering and carriers who didn't show, on shifts that start early and run long. They don't sit by the phone waiting for a broker, but they do answer when they need capacity, and the broker who calls at the right moment gets a load to quote.
What slows freight sales calls down
- Shippers answer on their own schedule. Dispatch and dock people pick up between trucks, often early in the morning or late in the afternoon, and a call that rings out at the wrong minute is a missed chance.
- Calls go to many regions. A broker's shippers sit in plants, warehouses and distribution centers across the country, and an unfamiliar out-of-area number is easy to ignore.
- Shipper lists change constantly. Facilities open and close, freight changes hands, and the logistics manager you spoke to last season may run a different site now. Numbers on a bought list are often main lines or numbers that no longer work. See data decay.
- It takes many touches. Shippers already have brokers they use, so a new broker earns a load through repeated, well-timed calls, and each one needs the last conversation in front of the rep.
- Reps sell and book at once. Brokers who also cover loads and talk to carriers make prospecting calls in the gaps, so those gaps have to produce conversations.
How Personnect fits a freight brokerage
Personnect is a parallel dialer for B2B outbound sales teams that calls up to five people at once per rep. When a shipper picks up between trucks, the rep is connected the moment a person answers, with the contact's details already on screen. Voicemail is detected and skipped, so the rep moves on to the next contact.
Personnect calls each contact from a local number in their own area code, and coverage shows which area codes your list needs, so you rent only those. Personnect offers local numbers from $1 a month each.
Michael, the assistant built into Personnect, checks each lead's title, company and phone number before anyone dials, and every lead comes back enriched, stale or retired, with bad numbers flagged. Personnect offers lead enrichment at 15¢ a lead, and unanswered calls still verify your contacts.
After each call, the summary, transcript and outcome of every call are logged and synced to your CRM, so the rep has nothing to type, so the next call to that shipper starts from the last conversation. Personnect offers native two-way integrations with HubSpot and Salesforce; any other CRM through CSV import and export, and a direct integration on request. No CRM needed: upload a list and Personnect works as your outbound CRM, with contacts, call history, outcomes and recordings in one place.
Pricing is 8.5¢ per minute on answered calls, and calls that ring out, are busy or fail cost nothing. Personnect has no seat fees, no platform fee and unlimited users, and there is no contract and no minimum term on the usage plan.
A first line to try on a shipper
Shippers hear from brokers all the time, so be short and specific about where they ship:
Hi, is this [first name]? This is [your name] from [your brokerage].
I know I'm calling out of the blue. I work with logistics managers at companies like [their company], usually on moving freight on time at a predictable cost. Do you ship out of [city] to [region]?
If they have a broker they're happy with, don't argue. Ask for one lane or one load to quote, and call back when capacity is tight.
For the full script, with questions, the ask, pushback answers and a voicemail, use the free cold call script generator with the Logistics and freight industry and the Operations manager role.
Calling rules for freight sales calls
Rules on sales calls can apply when you call businesses too. The glossary explains the main terms, with official sources:
Brokers who call early or late should know whose clock counts: where calling time rules apply, it's the called person's local time, not the caller's. An area code is only a hint about where someone is, since people keep mobile numbers when they move. The free prospect local time tool shows the local time for an area code before you dial. This isn't legal advice.