At Parade, we want to get your loads in front of carriers with capacity before they book out their trucks. One way we do this is via the Dispatch Campaign. We use machine learning to identify which carriers to contact when about which loads and email them matching freight. In this article, we want to provide a detailed overview of the Dispatch Campaign works.
Can I see Dispatch Campaign emails in Parade?
Yes. Go to the Messages tab and select Outbound Messages. This shows all emails sent today; you can filter for just the Dispatch Campaign:
If you click on any email you can actually see what the carrier saw by clicking on "View Sent Email" (in upper right):
On the Digital Health Booking report you can see how many Dispatch Campaign emails are sent per week. (Scroll down to Emails Sent by Type by Week)
How does the Dispatch Campaign determine what to send?
This is a little complicated, but it boils down to two things:
Is a carrier eligible to receive an email?
Is there a matching load?
Before we dive into this, we want to emphasize one point: the Dispatch Campaign is not a tool to guarantee that if a carrier expresses a lane preference once then every time a matching load comes in they will receive an email about that load.
The Dispatch Campaign profiles what a carrier wants over time using machine learning. It updates these preferences based on what a carrier actually does. It is not a rules engine that says "if this, then that."
If you want a rules engine - don't worry - Parade has one: Smart Rules. If you want to ensure that a carrier is informed about 100% of the freight on a lane, create a Lane Preference for that lane and set it to Instant Send. Behind the scenes, we will create a Smart Rule that will send all matching freight to that carrier.
With that in mind, let's go deeper on the Dispatch Campaign.
First, know that it runs every hour.
Once an hour we go through all your carriers and determine if they are eligible to be sent a Dispatch Campaign email:
Is the carrier configured to be in the dispatch campaign? By default all carriers are; we will skip a carrier if they no longer have a primary contact, if they are disabled for Parade or if the email automation setting is turned off.
Has the carrier already been sent sufficient Dispatch Campaigns for today or this week? By default, we will only send a maximum of two dispatch campaigns per day (you can request this be changed). We also machine learn, based on email opens/clicks, if carriers should receive the Dispatch Campaign 3, 5 or 10 (default) times per week. If the carrier has hit its limit for the day or week, the Dispatch Campaign won't send.
Is it the right time to send the Dispatch Campaign? Behind the scenes, we configure which days of the week (default: weekdays) and hours of the day (default: 7am-5pm EST) when the campaign should be sent. You can request that any of these be changed.
Every hour we also go through and determine if there is matching freight for a carrier. Our algorithm for matching includes over 20 signals, each weighted differently and constantly changing weightings. Our full algorithm is a trade secret so we will not disclose all inputs, but we will highlight some:
Loads opened and clicked via emails, your private portal, or partner networks
Historical capacity including loads delivered, quotes, and capacity not used
Data from 3rd parties like MyCarrierPackets (if subscriber), RMIS (if subscriber), and the FMCSA
Any preference data collected via your brokerage e.g., Lane Preferences or Smart Rules
If both carrier eligibility and the matching algorithm produce results, then we will send a Dispatch Campaign email. Note that we will limit the number of recommendations in the email to 15 (configurable) and won't recommend loads more than 10 calendar days in the future (also configurable).
I think Parade should send more Dispatch Campaign emails. What can I do?
Ask your Customer Success Manager to help you tweak some of the variables described above (e.g., days of week and time of day). We can also set all of your carriers to receive emails 10 times per week (but recognize that if they don't act on your emails the system will learn and set them back to 3 or 5 per week; this is so that they don't unsubscribe from emails from you).
Also: ask yourself if you want more Dispatch Campaign emails or if you want to notify select carriers about select lanes. if it's the latter, you should be using Smart Rules, and your Customer Success manager can help.