4 Benefits to Look for In Smart Route Optimization Software

Every year, customer expectations around delivery change at least a little bit. A recent study showed that nearly 70% of people wouldn’t reorder from a company that failed to deliver within the promised time window. That shift puts pressure on delivery organizations across the board. 

Here’s another shift that has a big impact on delivery businesses: fuel prices in the US were up 10% year over year in 2023—but as of April 2024 are actually lower than the 2022 baseline. Comparatively cheap fuel is nice while you can get it, but that level of fluctuation suggests that kind of volatility that distributors are dealing with when they make and execute their delivery plans. 

That’s just a part of why, now more than ever, finding the right route optimization software is non-negotiable if you want to stay efficient and ensure customer satisfaction. But how do you choose the best software for your needs? 

What Most Route Optimization Software Gets Wrong

If you look at Google’s suggestions for the best route optimization software options, you might find that a lot of them aren’t really built for complex use cases like big and bulky deliveries or B2B distribution operations. 

Either they’re lightweight, simple solutions for finding the shortest routes—or they’re route optimization capabilities tacked on to larger ERP or telematics solutions. In both cases, what gets lost is the nuance that goes into creating routes that actually work for more complex business cases.

Here are a 4 things that differentiate the best routing solutions from the less valuable options:

• Service time: Different types of deliveries will require different amounts of time on site, which will in turn determine how many deliveries you can make per day and what time customers should expect their delivery teams. When your route optimization can’t account for that, it becomes exceedingly difficult to deliver on time.
• Self-scheduling: When you let customers choose their own delivery time slots, you’re always going to sacrifice some efficiency. But the ability to enable customer self-scheduling within your parameters such that you can still run efficient and cost-effective routes is crucial for keeping costs down.
• Customer prioritization: In industries like food and beverage distribution, route planners need an easy way to ensure that their route optimization prioritizes customers correctly. Your routing engine needs a way to keep high priority customers in the same positions on your routes while optimizing the positions of lower-priority customers around them. 
• Integration with strategic route planning: A lightweight routing tool might give you the ability to generate daily routes, but it might be missing out on functionality for generating route plans that cover an entire week, with different baseline route plans for different days based on your customers. Conversely, some solutions offer just strategic route planning without an easy way to turn those plans into daily plans that actually work. 

For some businesses, these problems aren’t really problems at all—lighter routing options will work just fine. But for businesses that actually grapple with the kinds of last mile routing challenges we’re discussing, you need a route optimization software solution that’s purpose-built with those challenges in mind. 

How DispatchTrack’s Route Optimization Solves Last Mile Challenges

DispatchTrack’s route optimization capabilities were built to empower big and bulky deliveries—whether that’s a new armoire or dishwasher or a pallet of fizzy water and a number of kegs. 

Our solution provides:

• 98% ETA accuracy thanks to configurable service times and AI-powered traffic predictions
• Faster routing by more than 50% with an intuitive UX and scalable SaaS architecture 
• 10%+ decrease in miles driven and associated costs
• Total visibility into delivery costs at the planning stage to enable data-driven route decisions
• Strategic route planning to optimize routes by days of the week
• Increased flexibility and what-if scenarios
• Total integration with the rest of the last mile delivery process

When it comes to dynamic route optimization, we enable users to configure their routing parameters to fit their specific business case. They can specify different service times for different product or service types, they can match the right orders to the right equipment or personnel, and they can even route based on skill level so that you aren’t sending highly-skilled team members to do low-skill jobs. 

The best part is that the whole system is intuitive and easy to use—no need for binders full of complex instructions for getting the routing engine to behave. Routing can be as easy as circling some orders and clicking a button, and you can make manual adjustments as needed without losing out on efficiency or breaking the routes. 

The result is that DispatchTrack’s users save time and money with easier routing and more effective routes. Drivers drive fewer miles, route planners have fewer sleepless nights and hours of frustration, and your customers can rely on on-time deliveries from your team. 

DispatchTrack Route Optimization Success Stories

DispatchTrack track offers one of the best route optimization software options for big and bulky deliveries and many other use cases. But don’t just take our word for it. Here’s what some of the thousands of businesses we’ve supported over the years have had to say about DispatchTrack and its route optimization capabilities: 

Luis Porto, Director, Operations Development at Quirch Foods

"DispatchTrack’s routing has helped us to utilize equipment significantly more efficiently. Before adopting their solution, we were totally reliant on the knowledge of dispatchers and drivers. Now, we can actually take on more customers with the same equipment thanks to DispatchTrack."

Alvaro Celis, DOT Routing Specialist at Wismettac Asian Foods, Inc

"With DispatchTrack, we can make sure our routes are profitable. It makes life a thousand times easier to have all the info right there when you’re routing—and the owners are ecstatic."

Daniel Miller, Routing Analyst at S. Bertram Inc.

"DispatchTrack has revolutionized our delivery experience, reduced costs and made us more sustainable by reducing the amount of miles and fuel we use"

Graeme Wilson, Managing Director, Vision Logistics

"With DispatchTrack, all the information is right there. We can add stops, deliveries, and pickups to a route on the road instead of having to call the driver—reducing time on the phone for both the transportation department and driver… DispatchTrack has helped us save more than $120,000 in 2 years—and that’s before we even put a number on the time savings..."

Jimmy Perez, Vice President of Operations at Freedom Fresh

These are just a few examples—you can read more customer stories at dispatchtrack.com/customers

DispatchTrack was built to handle the complexities of modern last mile deliveries, and that’s why users who have switched to our route optimization capabilities have often seen huge improvements in multiple areas:

• Time spent routing—even in complex use cases, we’re able to save customers significant amounts of time, meaning that they can reroute more frequently and leverage later cutoff times for orders. 
• Route costs—we offer unprecedented levels of cost visibility, so our users can visualize which routes are the most cost-effective at the planning stage; at the same time, our optimization helps ensure that the routes are shorter and therefore less costly. 
• Data integration and visibility—DispatchTrack acts as a single source of truth for the last mile, with live delivery visibility, planning, driver management, and other functionality all housed within a single-pane-of-glass.
• Ease-of-use/implementation—we’ve helped major enterprises transition to DispatchTrack in a matter of a few months, and we pride ourselves on making the process as seamless as possible while ensuring a quick time to value. 

To learn more about how DispatchTrack’s route optimization software can impact your operations, don’t hesitate to reach out to one of our experts directly.