Edge Logistics cut their average response time from 4 minutes to less than 1 minute with Front.
Edge Logistics is a freight technology solution providing full service shipping needs. They specialize in full truck load, dry and refrigerated trucks, and LTL. More than 70 Edge teammates use Front to manage email and group aliases for support, carriers, tracking, and more. Front has enabled Edge to work more productively, which allows them to respond faster and gain a competitive advantage.
CEO Will Kerr of Edge Logistics tells how Front helped his team cut response time from 4 minutes to less than 1.
Challenge
Edge CEO Will Kerr said they needed a solution to process email accurately and quickly, despite high volume. “We have a lot of different email accounts and many are managed by different customer service teams. Even with distribution lists and shared mailboxes in Outlook, we were finding it difficult to get back to all of our customers in a timely manner. We were seeing issues with the accuracy of our responses and with how fast we were moving," Kerr said.
We just got overwhelmed with the volume of email. A lot of duplicate emails to customers, a lot of missed emails, people not knowing who was in charge of what. From an accountability and distribution perspective, it became unmanageable.
Solution
After researching ticketing systems like Zendesk, customer service platforms, IT support apps, and more, they found Front. "None of them fit what we were trying to accomplish until we found Front," Kerr explained. “Front is an excellent solution for our industry but also anyone doing email-based customer service.”
Now Edge has inboxes dedicated to each email account in Front. "That way a customer can send everything to one place and then it’s automatically distributed to the team based on who is available, who owns the relationship or even what the subject line is.”
Results
Kerr said with Front, they are able to respond in a more timely and accurate fashion to all inbound requests from customers, whether it’s a service issue, a quoting issue, any other incoming communication.
Heightened productivity means increased revenue
Front lets teams comment on emails internally to discuss next steps on deals and support requests. And with shared inboxes, everyone has the context they need to move quickly. Kerr was able to use Front’s analytics to understand how each person is positively contributing to their business.
Once we implemented Front, we saw that we were doing more revenue per person on the customer sales team. Front allows us to get more things done in a smaller amount of time, more accurately, per person.
Cutting response time from 4 minutes to less than 1
“Before we started using Front, our average response time per email was about four and a half minutes. And since we’ve started using Front, we’ve been able to cut that down under one minute. That is a key metric for us because oftentimes being the first to respond is how we win the business,” Kerr said.
“We’re in a speed and accuracy game. And if you can quote quickly and respond faster, and participate in more bidding, that sets you apart from the rest of the industry. Ultimately, you can you can win over customers and position yourself as a smarter broker."
With Front, we’re able to respond faster, we’re able to get things on the right person’s desk more quickly, and we’re able to get instant approval from decision makers when needed. We don’t know what we’d do without Front.
Expanding business through many communication channels
The Edge team decided to leverage live chat to gain new business, and they’re managing it with ease in Front. “Before, people were coming to our site and looking around and we weren’t executing deals with them. Now, we can take advantage of that business in real time. It’s been a really effective sales channel for us and gives us more visibility into who is interacting with us in what way.”
Increased accountability brings clarity and high-quality work
Edge uses Front’s assignments to ensure everyone knows what they’re responsible for responding to. Front has alleviated the sense of ambiguity around shared emails by allowing the team to establish clear next steps. “From a culture perspective, Front has added an extra layer of accountability for every person on team. If you’re assigned something, you’re the only one who’s got that on their plate. And if you don’t do it, then you’re going to let the rest of the team down."
It’s become the status quo to deliver excellent performance.
No more duplication of work
"We get a lot of requests for pricing through email. Before Front, we might have two people respond at the same time and quote things slightly differently to the customer. That would reflect badly on us and slow us down. With Front, we’re able to know exactly when someone else is working on a quote."
Scaling to meet demand
Since the Edge team can work more efficiently in Front, they’ve been able to serve more customers with the same team. “Front really allows you to scale up without having to hire a ton of people. We do a ton of business with a small team, and that’s because of Front.”
Easy to implement and use
Kerr said onboarding with Front was a breeze. They started with a small group, and with the help of an onboarding manager at Front, they rolled it out to the rest of the organization. "It takes very basic training and the user interface is very similar to Outlook or Gmail or whatever you might be using now. You just have to get used to things not working exactly the same as a Microsoft product."
I think one of the best things about Front is that it’s really simple and really easy to implement. It takes almost no time whatsoever.
Cutting down on errors for high-risk communications
In a people-oriented business, Kerr said Front provides a great safety net. "Front has definitely cut down on errors caused by miscommunication or unresponsiveness on our side," Kerr noted. "It’s a layer of protection to make sure that you’ll never miss anything critical, whether it be a situation with your customer, answering a quote, or making sure you take advantage of every business opportunity.”
Planning ahead with Front analytics
Edge uses Front’s analytics to plan ahead for increased demand and proactively solve issues before they happen. “The analytics on Front makes it so you know where your volume is coming in and reallocate headcount to address that. Before, we could see total volume numbers, but it was tough to understand what was going wrong."
Front adds a layer of data and visibility that we really need in order to plan ahead.
