SONAR tickers: OTRI.CHI, OTVI.CHI, VOTLT.CHI
SONAR’s brokerage customers utilize multiple data sets to determine where the greatest opportunities lie as different markets experience volatility. Tender volumes, rejections, market share and lead times help identify market conditions before a broker sees a disruption in rates.
Think of tender volumes as the demand for capacity whereas tender rejections are the response of capacity toward that demand. Load tenders may be rejected due to a breakdown, or there may be other higher paying loads that a carrier is prioritizing instead. As tender rejections increase, routing guides can fall apart, creating opportunities for brokers to service that freight and potentially onboard a customer. SONAR’s Outbound Tender Rejection Index — coupled with the Tender Lead Times and Outbound Tender Volume Indexes — can demonstrate these changes in near-real-time and is updated daily.
Brokers use custom pages and the Most Volatile Markets widget to stay ahead of disruptions and determine where they can purchase capacity, identify target markets to call on customers, and which loads they should prioritize for coverage due to tightening conditions.
Custom Pages
The beauty of custom pages or dashboards in SONAR is the ability to view data sets (such as the Outbound Tender Rejection Index) in multiple forms. Brokers will sometimes view data sets in the chart view seen above, but many customer-facing sales teams view tender rejections and outbound tender market share in a map format. By comparing tender rejections and tender market share, account managers can select markets that have more freight moving to ensure there is ample opportunity when they call on customers.
For example, Baltimore is seeing rejections and more outbound tenders than much of the western U.S.:
SONAR tickers: OTRI.USA, OTMS.USA
The Most Volatile Markets
The Most Volatile Markets widget provides multiple essential data points in one view, allowing brokers to quickly identify whether markets are experiencing tightening or loosening capacity, increasing or decreasing volumes, or rejections are increasing. The Most Volatile Markets widget highlights markets that are experiencing volatility outside of their norm; for example, if Chicago outbound tender rejections are seeing a strong decrease in combination with a decrease in tender lead times, there is a good chance that loads are hitting the spot market.
SONAR customers who are performing better than average often combine market-level insights with rate data in Market Dashboard to ensure they are capturing as many opportunities as possible, resulting in an increase in revenue and service levels.
The Dynamic Duo: Market Insights + Near-Real-Time Rates
One of the most direct ways to view key market-level indicators such as tender rejections and how rates follow their movements is within Market Dashboard, a rate management dashboard that shows current spot and contract rates on a lane, along with a historic chart view and multiple other market analytic data points (such as origin and destination capacity conditions, tender rejections and prescriptive actions).
Looking at an example dry van lane — Chicago to St. Louis — we can see how increased rejections result in upward pressure on spot rates and vice versa.
By proactively utilizing data sets such as the Outbound Tender Rejection Index, Outbound Tender Market Share and Tender Lead Times and applying them to their daily operations, SONAR’s brokerage customers can identify areas of volatility, which enables them to take advantage of opportunities that arise in markets before the overall market feels shifts in their rates or service.
SONAR customers can learn more by reaching out to their Customer Success Manager. Not a SONAR customer? Find out more here.
