If you are a fleet owner, you already know the importance of load boards. Certain trucking companies rely on private contracts, but when it's time to expand they usually rely on load boards to find new customers. There are so many load boards out there and new ones are entering the market consistently.
But the question remains, which load board is the best one? Well, there is no exact science to determine that phenomenon. But, as the saying goes “To Each Their Own” fits perfectly in this context. As the best load board for you is the one you need, it all depends on different factors such as; the size of the business, the loads you want to cater to, future goals, fleet size, and more.
A load board is an application or website whose purpose is to connect shippers and freight brokers to carriers. Just imagine it as Tinder for truckers, but the goal is to find loads not love. Certain load boards for trucks also provide load-tracking services.
These online load boards make it easier for both parties to find work and often develop long-term business relationships. They also provide information such as when payments for a particular load will be made and fleet owners can also post the availability of their trucks.
Load boards are especially useful for those who are new to the business or have small to medium-sized fleets. Those with larger fleets usually have in-house brokers to manage their loads.
A benefit of using a load board is that it gets easier to negotiate on price since many carriers are looking for work. You can also easily exchange documents and other bits of information directly on load boards.
FYI
If you have a TMS with integrations, you can get a compiled list of all load board listings on one screen and you can use dispatch communication tools to directly negotiate terms. This helps you save time and you can connect with more customers than ever before.
As a fleet owner or someone who is in the trucking industry, you should know about the different types of load boards for trucking on offer:
Some load boards are completely free to use, they generate their income through product and ad placements on their website. They are very useful in finding loads and truckers, but some might not have all the features that are found on paid load boards.
Just like the name suggests, they exist to connect people to truckers to carry partial loads. This means that people will send goods that will only take up a portion of the truck cargo space.
These trucking load boards are useful for truckers that have a small space available after picking up a heavy load or for truckers who have just completed delivery and have nothing to haul back home.
All other load boards are paid. You might be charged a fee for subscriptions to things like; average rates being paid for types of loads, for posting fleet availability, and load posting. All of this makes it easier for you to negotiate terms.
It all depends on how you use the platforms. One of the biggest issues is that it gets difficult to find more profitable loads due to the high competition on these platforms. But with the right communication skills, and planning you can find some real gems, even long-term customers.
Load boards are especially useful when you are new to the industry or when you are looking to expand your business. The most important thing to understand is that you can not solely rely on load boards for business success. And at the same time, you should not be ignoring load boards either.
There are so many load boards out there, and some are better than others. The majority of load boards have also been developed into mobile applications. We, however, will discuss 5 of the most used load boards by carriers.
DAT boasts a database of over 1.3 million trucks in its network. They also have nearly 887,000 load posts daily. Being one of the oldest load boards in the industry, DAT is among one of the most trusted load boards in the country.
There are 3 main platforms within the DAT platform namely: DATPower for carriers and brokers, DAT Express for brokers, and DAT TruckersEdge for carriers. Besides providing a load board they offer many other services as well such as factoring, fuel cards, tracking, and more.
The standard package costs $45 a month which does the job but doesn’t come with all the bells and whistles. Furthermore, the most expensive package costs $295 a month. They also have a combination of services included in different packages and are tailored-made for a one-stop shop solution.
This is one of the very few high-quality load boards left that still allows free load posting. 123Loadboard also offers some of the cheapest rates in the industry. Moreover, they provide their customers with a free load board application and a 10-day free trial for their premium features.
There are over 50 million truckloads posted on their platform each year. Moreover, their premium packages are often cheaper than other companies' standard packages.
The company was founded in 1997 and since its inception, they have been offering load board services free of charge. Direct Freight offers many free features that you would otherwise have to pay for and not the standard package, but the mid-range package for most load boards.
Being an owner-operator you can see insurance information of brokers, bonds, authority, and credit scores. Moreover, you can also send and save documents, show your load bookings, and see payment options.
It also provides TMS integration and provides other useful features such as email alerts, weather reports, and important audible notifications.
Truckstop is among the pioneers of the industry and has more than 600,000 brokers as well as carriers in its system. One of the advantages of this load board is that it helps you search a large number of loads in a quick time. Moreover, you can view new loads in real-time.
You can also compare up to 10 loads at the same time and their app lets you directly negotiate with brokers. Truckstop offers different features like document management, GPS tracking, and load tracking. They also offer a wide range of services such as carrier credit reports and freight factoring.
is a digital freight network company that provides a load board for truckers using a freight marketplace that integrates machine learning, automation, and software services.
This allows for more efficient and cost-effective shipping, increased carrier earnings, improved efficiency, real-time planning, and transparent supply chain insights.
Their system is fairly easy to use but still offers built-in instruction manuals and round-the-clock customer service.
Our truck management software comes with load-board integration options. Through integrations, you need not open different load boards on different windows. But loads from all the integrated load boards will appear in one window on our software. You can then use filters to find loads that you want to cater to.
Load Stop also has a built-in dispatch-to-carrier communication tool, that lets you directly negotiate terms. Our software automatically sends emails to your existing customers about the availability of your trucks. You can compare different loads and our AI will identify loads that are the most profitable for your company.
There is so much more so you should book a live demo with our representatives, to find out more about why our TMS is the one-stop shop solution to manage your fleet with efficiency and maximum profitability.
Sara Naveed is a creative and digital content writer who uses her creative skills to develop and edit professional web content. Being a writer has always been her dream. She earnestly hopes people appreciate her writing—an asset she deeply covets. Using her 8+ years of working experience, she writes for trucking industry experts who are always looking for better technological solutions to their problems.
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