Gatekeepers, False Reports, and Other Freight Broker Headaches | Final Mile 111

some interesting discussion , so we're going to pull our questions from there today . But if you're brand new , check out all the other content . You can check out the Freight Broker Basics course on our website if you're looking for an educational option , and please check out the sponsors of this show to help support the channel . Ben , let's get right into it .

This is I'm four weeks in and I'm having trouble landing a client . So a couple thoughts here . My first one is expectation management . I wouldn't expect anybody who's brand new at anything to be very good at it .

Four weeks in , you're still in a learning curve process and even if you're a really good freight broker and prospecting as a freight broker , four weeks is still not a very long time . You know . We talk about the amount of touches it takes and conversations it takes to build rapport and knock down that trust barrier .

Just , you know , and that's just to have those conversations . You haven't even yet started quoting this customer , yet conversations . You haven't even yet started quoting this customer yet . So what's your take on expectation management for somebody that's brand new at it ?

One month in , you know , and then we can kind of give some tips on how to , you know , shorten that timeline as much as they can .

I had probably an over an hour conversation with somebody and I mean it was probably one of the better calls I've had all year . Like there were so many things we connected on hobbies , interests , and like even literally at the end he's like man , dude , you guys spent 35 minutes talking to me .

I think it was about like fishing , right , and he's like dude , yeah , I'll give you a shot , I'm going to try to help you get worked in .

And like great call , like it was as close to a 10 out of 10 as you can get Time rapport and also the company is where I grew up , so we had lots of things to be able to like you know , chat about and connect on .

And I spoke to him again like probably about 10 days later , usually about like when I kind of do like my first follow up another great call . And like was very honest . Like hey , look , man , I absolutely . It's still on my to do list . Did not forget about you . I will help you guys out , I'll help you get in . Just be a little patient with me .

So like I'll probably have my third follow-up call like the end of this week , which will be five weeks four or five weeks probably since my first call , right , and I'm like that is like a realistic expectation .

And the thing that I think is hard is when you're younger and in your like 20s , I would get frustrated because my perception of the decision makers were like , dude , you don't have 10 minutes to be able to do this one thing .

So like I could get on board and start working with you because all I cared about was what I was trying to do , right , but then once you get older and more companies are selling me , then I'm on the phone selling too .

Like I have a lot of stuff to do and there are genuinely people that I want to get back to on things that , like I just can't do them all in one day . And as you get more responsibilities and you get older in your career , like you can't do everything that you need to or want to every day . So like it just takes longer .

So like not only does your patience grow , but like understanding why it takes longer to get approved and onboarded with a new company makes a lot more sense the older you get . So like if I'm , if I was talking to myself , it would just be like one patience and don't approach it like you're selling somebody

or closing a deal , and there's all these memes and videos and books you can read on how to close a deal and negotiate , but like at the end of the day you're just trying to get somebody to know you , trust you and like you , and like that takes time . It takes time . Any person you've ever met in your life that you became friends with .

It does not happen the first time you meet them . You might like them and have a good time , but you're not like texting each other and are like bonding and are very good friends and doing things for each other . Like 48 hours later you got to see them a couple of times . It takes some time to get comfortable .

It happens in every aspect of life and I think , like to your point , like that is probably the most important thing . I wish I was better at .

prospecting tool and it's basically like they're trying to leverage AI to do voice calls and email campaigns and they got a call center to try . They're basically trying to present you with some warm leads , um , you know , and then you know the broker takes over and tries to your get on the call .

You know you're basically you're paying to get past the gatekeeper and have warm leads and then you still gotta go and close them . So , um , I he's like , hey , I wanted to show this to you . Um , and I was like , cool , I'll hop on a meeting with them , hopped on a meeting with them and it was a terrible sales presentation .

But then we did a follow-up this week and this guy he understands that like I'm a busy person and I've got like 150 people under my umbrella that I manage and that I oversee and they all have needs all day long . So when I'm in a meeting with a company trying to sell to me it's taking away time from my day to help focus on our business .

Business and this guy I literally , for like an hour , was the owner of the company was like high pressure sales , you know , like literally like I gave him every reason in the world .

Yeah , he did not want to take no for an answer did not listen , probably I got to a point where I was like I was like , and even like the , the guy on our team that , like , first reached out to them .

He even said like when I'm on here talking to you , I can't be out there making money right now , like , uh , and I had basically the same thing to say to him .

It's like there's a very quick way to lose a potential customer's business forever and it's if you not only do you catch them at a bad time or bother them , but if you go so far as to offend them and not , you know , not listen to what they're blatantly telling you . So , understand that not every prospect is the same .

More so , no prospect is exactly the same , because they might work at the same company or sell the same or ship the same kind of commodity , but each individual person is different from one another .

And understanding that it takes time to to understand , all right , this role at this company is in charge of this and , like you said , right , it takes , you know , if it takes weeks for someone to get back to you on something , um , they're a busy person , right .

So that's , and I'll kind of wind up on a tangent there , but just situational awareness is what I would call it . When it comes to like the rapport building and understanding , like , if you kind of get the gut feeling that the conversation is not going anywhere , probably take an exit ramp and get out of that conversation and maybe try again another day .

Rapport building and understanding , Like , if you kind of get the gut feeling that the conversation is not going anywhere , probably take an exit ramp and get out of that conversation and maybe try again on our day . Don't force it to a point where you're going to flip the , flip the car over . So that's my take on it .

Yeah , but yeah , expectation management , it doesn't happen fast . Those first . You know 500,000 calls are getting better at making the calls . That's what you should be focusing on for yourself . All right , next question Does anybody know where I can get hands-on training as a freight agent ? You know it's funny .

I deal with this question super often because our brokerage , pierceville-wide , is agent-based . We're always looking for top quality brokers that want to be an agent for our company . We see if they're a good fit , but there's so many unqualified people that reach out to us . They're always like

where do I go and get started as an agent ? The reason that they want to be an agent is because they want that remote work they don't want to be an agent is because they want that remote work , the they don't want to . They don't want to be someone's employee , they want to .

It's almost like the entrepreneurial franchise business model , um , but they want to like how do I get trained on how to do this ? And there's not , like an easy answer to it .

Um , there are people out there who have created brokerages that have a training like separate training entity , where they'll try to feed you into their brokerage upon completion of the training , and I think the turnover is just so high .

What I would recommend for somebody , though , is that , if you know it , it's going to all come down to like networking personally with someone for them to give you a shot , right , and I always tell people , like go to our Facebook group , introduce yourself , just kind of hang out , observe , look for people that are offering training and things like that , and I

would find someone that is willing to let you either shadow them or just kind of learn the ropes , and expect a very low commission split , because they're taking a huge risk on you , and there's probably someone out there that's willing to do that .

Expect a very low commission split because they're taking a huge risk on you and that there's probably someone out there that's willing to do that . But companies that have very structured agent programs aren't going to take you if you don't have experience .

So it's , you know , find someone , network and , you know , offer to do it at a very , very reduced commission rate or no commission rate for the first X amount of days , right , something like that . What would you add in Someone who's looking for like just the training in general ?

Because I mean , our course is great if you want to learn how to start your own business , but to be an agent , someone else is trusting you to represent their brand , so it's a very different situation there .

Whatever that compensation is Right , because if you are new and you're expecting somebody to train you , that is a cost that the person you're asking has to pay . Like , if I go to you and I need you to train me , nate , you are paying me right With your time to train me .

So , like you now can't do other things , so I have to give you something in return , right , I either got to work for you for free , or work for you to reduce rate to make it worth your while , just for the training hours , or work for you to reduce rate to make it worth your while just for the training hours and time for you to do that .

Then the second thing is , every mistake I make is a risk to jeopardizing everything you built , which is the second thing you're asking from this person .

So you need to look at this as like , hey , I know you want to get something from someone else , which is training and experience you need to think about what can you provide to them that makes it worth their while ?

Again , it's the same as the other question Think about it from their perspective and it's hey , I either can work for you for a reduced commission , I can work and help you cover freight for free for a period of time . What is it ?

And what I would do is I would reach out to a bunch of agents and say I'm looking for experience , I'm willing to help on whatever you need . I'm willing to work on either reduced pay or even free for some period of time . You let me know what you need help with so that I can give you something in return to learn from your experience .

And then , little by little , day after day , week after week , you could grow from there into running your own freight , doing more responsible tasks , but out of the gate , like you're basically asking somebody to give you a whole bunch of things that they don't get anything in return from .

So you got to figure out and it's different for every person , like you said . That's why you got to network and talk to lots of other agents and find out , like what does that agent specifically need right now ? Maybe it's doing lead research , maybe it's lead generation , maybe it's organizing BOLs , maybe it's going through accounting stuff .

Who knows what that agent needs . But I'm like , hey , I will help you a couple hours a day for free or some reduced rate for a period of time . If we trust each other and it works out , maybe we can talk about learning some more from you and I can start upping my responsibilities .

And we look at those and we're like , yeah , well , there's no guarantee that they're going to give you business to run brokerage wise . So I've been able to pair folks like that up in the past successfully with an agent of ours where they offer , like the , the driver basically says like hey , you know , here's what's in it for you .

I will introduce my customer to you and , um , get some loads to run through you

to prove that the business is there . If I can do that for a little bit of time , will you then bring me on under your agency to be a sub agent for you ? And I've seen it work great because it helps both parties .

Like the agent gets to make extra money and then the driver who's now a sub agent , they've got a second stream of income Plus if they're driving and busy , they've got someone that can be another point of contact for the customer .

I've seen that work twice at our company , but that person has a leg up on someone that has no experience because they're already a driver who has a customer that they haul direct for . But here's what's in it for you as well , instead of what can you give just to me ?

Last one is does anyone have an idea how to get a false report removed from carrier 411 ? It's really starting to affect getting my driver's brokered loads to come home , so I'll expand this out to beyond just carrier 411 .

I've dealt with this with Highway TIA , watchdog , google , dat , all right , when it comes to a report , depending on the platform , there's usually a dispute option . That's in there . Ok , and I know that are my brokerage that I work for , we have had to go through the steps to have false reports removed .

If it's like Google or something like that , but just a review , you don't get them removed but you can respond to them . Right , google and DAT we always respond .

But if it's a false report like we've had someone report to us that we did something bad as a broker but someone had tried to steal our identity and got caught so it's like well , we're not , you know , flag us for our identity and got caught .

So it's like well , we're not , you know , flag us for our identity being stolen , don't flag us for holding a load hostage or whatever it was . So what you need to do is just go talk to the company . So in this case , go to 411 .

I don't want to use them , but go to 411 and say , hey , like there's a false freight guard on me , false report on me , do I have the ability to either respond to it or dispute it because it's not accurate ? I would do that versus going to a Facebook group .

But by going to a Facebook group you did get us to answer it on our show , so hopefully that helps . Have you ever had to deal with that or any stories on what's worked for you ? I ? haven't Doing nothing is not going to help you , I can , at least you know .

I would first call , I would send an email and I would probably , in that email , copy and paste you know the false report and I would explain politely , right Like you're not going to get somebody to help you by yelling at them and say , hey , this is the situation , this is what occurred , what steps or is there anything we can do because it's adversely

affecting my business ? See what they respond . If they don't respond , then call again . Right , like I would just keep following up to see what I can do .

I've had a bunch of those too where it's like , you know , there's a little bit of a gray area , and maybe it's about detention or toning or something like that , and we're like , hey , even if our customer's not going to approve this , we see your side in it , we'll get you paid . Would you mind taking that review down ?

And they're just like yeah , of course .

But , like your , fastest point of getting this resolved is the person that actually put the report who can take it down immediately 100% Good stuff . Final thoughts Whether you believe you can or believe you can't , you're right .