What is a Delivery Route Planner? Why is it efficient than traditional route planning solutions?

Do you want to streamline your last-mile delivery service?

Do you want to fulfill modern-day customer demands and delivery industry demands?

Then a dedicated delivery route planning software can assist you to transform your delivery operations with finesse.

But what is a delivery route planner, and how can you use it? 

You need to learn and understand the meaning and purpose of a delivery route planner, so without further ado, let’s get started.

What is a Delivery Route Planner?

A delivery route planner is a software that organizes and plans the shortest routes for delivery vehicles. It takes care of scheduling stops and may also provide extra features like real-time updates, GPS tracking, and flexible dispatching. This helps delivery fleets save time, reduce costs, and improve overall efficiency and you know why efficiency matters in delivery route planning.

What is Delivery Route Planning?

Delivery route planning is the strategic process of determining the most efficient path for delivering goods to customers, taking into account factors like traffic, delivery priorities, and vehicle and driver capabilities. This optimization ensures timely, cost-effective deliveries while maximizing customer satisfaction and overall logistics performance.

Traditionally businesses used the manual process of pen and paper and hired a local guide to find the most effective delivery path to optimize their delivery process.

But the impact of pandemics has disrupted the online delivery industry; customers now want everything delivered to their doorsteps within no time.

Every year, Americans lose  $1,348 and ​​97 hours because of traffic congestion. Imagine the impact on your last-mile delivery business if you cannot plan your delivery with real-time traffic updates and rely on a local guide.

Still, over 52% of the field service companies plan and optimize.

The manual route planning process cannot handle the spike in delivery demand, which introduces digital route planners. 

Don’t confuse a digital route planner with Google Maps.

Many businesses still use Google Maps as their delivery assistant, which increases the inefficiencies in their delivery ecosystem.

Why?

Because Google Maps is not a dedicated route planner. It doesn’t provide a flawless delivery management ecosystem and cannot handle bulk order deliveries with ease.

There are multiple inefficiencies that traditional delivery methods and Google Maps bring to the table for last-mile delivery planning.

Let’s find out.

What Are The Challenges in Traditional Delivery Route Planning?

1. No optimized and fast delivery paths

One of the most significant downsides of using a traditional route planning method or Google Maps is that you don’t get an optimized multi-stop delivery path that can assist you in matching the expectations of modern-day customers.

It results in delayed or failed deliveries resulting business losses, shrinkage of customer base, and running out of business.

The new trends in a last-mile delivery highlight that customers want fast, same-day deliveries of the essentials from a business, or else they’ll choose your competitor who can fulfill their demands.

Using a pen and paper strategy to achieve an efficient and agile same-day delivery in 2022. Even Google Maps doesn’t offer a highly optimized delivery path for over ten deliveries.

2. Increased chances of errors

Google Maps doesn’t have a dedicated route planning and delivery interface that can assist you in managing and optimizing your deliveries within a few clicks.

You can add a wrong address in Maps, leading to delivery delays and poor customer experience.

You can’t optimize the inefficiencies in the delivery ecosystem using Google Maps, and the same is the case with traditional route planning.

The inefficiencies rise with traditional route planning and optimizations because of human errors. The errors and the efficiencies make it difficult for delivery businesses to sustain the market with profits and achieve the desired business outcomes.

3. Ineffective bulk order management

Being a result-oriented business owner, don’t you want to scale your delivery business operations and lock in more profits and revenue. Right?

But with Google Maps and the traditional routing process, if you want to scale the delivery order processing results in increased inefficiencies and poor delivery experience.

You cannot deliver simplified solutions while handling bulk orders because both way don’t offer the expansion horizon while maintaining the accuracy and speed of deliveries.

4. Delayed time window

If you want to succeed in the delivery business and climb the industry ladder, you need to find an alternative from manual route planning or Google Maps.

Customers demand a minimum delivery time window because of their decreased patience levels and the trend of same-day last-mile delivery. But manual routing and Google Maps cannot help you fulfill these requirements.

The inefficiencies can increase the time window and affect your business conversion rate. 

How?

The delivery time window plays a vital role in ensuring that the customer makes the transaction with your business during the purchase process. If they feel the time window is higher, they’ll choose your competitors with agile delivery services.

5. No data storage

Using Google Maps or manual route planning, you won’t be able to store contactless proof of delivery during the final delivery.

With the new trend of contactless deliveries rising in the delivery industry and customers demanding from businesses to ensure proper precautions and countless deliveries, Google Maps and traditional route planning don’t stand a chance.

You cannot store data and secure it for later use. You cannot share information with the customers wherever they demand within a few clicks.

Businesses cannot use the power of data in today’s digital age to optimize their existing delivery operations by making well-informed decisions if they stick to old and outdated route planning techniques.

So what’s the solution to bypass these roadblocks and trouble of traditional route planning or Google Maps?

A dedicated delivery route planner software.

But what benefits does it offer that help it outshine the other two traditional route planning methods?

Benefits Offered by Route Planner Software

1. Automation

One of the powerful features of advanced route planners is that it integrates automation into the delivery ecosystem of the business. It helps streamline delivery management and removes redundancies and errors from delivery operations.

It minimizes human intervention in the delivery process by delivering route planning results within a few clicks. It helps businesses send automatic updates to the customers or the in-house team about the changes in the delivery process.

2. Real-time tracking

Route planner helps businesses get real-time visibility of the delivery process that can be shared with the customers to enhance the customer experience.

It helps the fleet management and on-ground delivery drivers to coordinate and work in sync. Real-time tracking improves the monitoring process of the delivery and bypasses dynamic problems with robust communication.

You get centralized control of the delivery operations and the ability to update the different touchpoints of the delivery operations in no time.

3. Minimizes additional costs

The increased efficiency of the delivery process and enhanced productivity result in the workforce minimizing the operational cost, fuel cost, and other expenses.

You can scale your profits and revenue and maintain a premium delivery experience at an affordable price. Customers look for businesses offering free or minimal delivery costs, and that’s achievable because of a professional route planner.

A route planner delivers an optimized and shortest multi-stop delivery path that increases the work rate and minimizes time and cost.

4. Robust analytics

A professional route planner offers delivery businesses to leverage data and improve their business operations.

You can extract in-depth reports of the delivery process and make well-informed decisions based on the collected data sets.

A route planner can provide you with different data points like average delivery cost, the work rate of your employees, and customer reviews, among others, to transform your delivery business by fixing up the loopholes or flaws.

The wider the horizon of data sets, the better the optimization of the delivery process.

5. Bulk delivery management

One of the top benefits of using a route planner is its ability to handle bulk orders and streamline the delivery process by breaking the complexities.

With solid logistics and an advanced delivery ecosystem, you escape the hassle of rising shipment orders and fulfilling the requirements of a broader customer base.

To simplify the delivery process, you need to update the delivery address in the route planner using an Excel sheet or other file to ensure that the bulk order routes are bifurcated into multiple drivers.

But not all route planners available in the market can deliver the best experience. You can select and choose from a few best Route Planners.

3 Best Delivery Route Planner Apps

1. Upper Route Planner

Being the best route planning and optimization software that can handle multiple orders with multiple stops, Upper Route Planner is the most affordable and effective software in a delivery ecosystem.

The unique UX/UI makes it easier to use its different features. You get access to the powerful dashboard that offers centralized control of your business operations.

• You can use the delivery route planner app for multiple industries.
• It minimizes the route planning time by 95%.
• It enhances the productivity of your team by 40%.
• You get in-depth reports for last-mile delivery operations.

Pros

• You can create cost and time-effective routes
• An affordable route planner
• Available with a 7-day free trial

Cons

• There are no voice directions available for the driver

2. RouteXL

Another leading route optimization software available for Android and iOS platforms, RouteXL is a powerful web-based route planner that uses a geocoding, global positioning system to help you effectively plan a route.

It delivers excellent optimization results with increased accuracy and precision because of the advanced algorithms used in the software. It offers QR code scanning, driver tracking, data sharing, and other features.

Pros

• You can save multiple routes
• You can add up to 200 address stops at a time
• It offers a drag-and-drop scheduler with powerful features

Cons

• No customer service
• It doesn’t offer proof of delivery

3. TourSolver

TourSolve is a cloud-based route planner that offers mileage tracking, dispatching, routing, and employee management features to streamline your business flow.

It is designed to handle the requirements of different businesses and industries. You can export delivery addresses using multiple files like PDF, iCalender, or Excel to simplify the route planning process.

Pros

• It offers multiple functionalities
• You get an optimized route plan
• Used for enhanced delivery and logistic operations

Cons

• Suitable for larger organizations
• Subscription is costly
• Takes time and effort to configure

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