Proven strategies waste haulers can use to unlock additional revenue
With Routeware’s wealth of direct industry experience, we’ve seen firsthand how focusing on some key levers can make a big difference to revenue. From plugging revenue leaks, to unlocking new income streams, here’s our advice to help you increase waste hauling revenue by making some small but important changes. We’ll also highlight some key technologies that can help accelerate these changes.
Bill more overages
The biggest win for many waste companies is improving the ability to bill for overages. This alone has a huge impact on revenue—nevermind the rest of your billing operation.
Given the number of overfilled containers that any driver encounters on their route, helping them record these issues and then address them with customers is a game-changer. Whether it’s charging an overage fee or selling the customers an upgraded service, you’ll increase income with no additional resource.
Our billing software doesn’t just increase waste hauling revenue—it also makes drivers’ lives easier.
Using in-cab computers, drivers can easily record overfilled containers—or even better, automatically capture photos of overloaded containers—turning what used to be a tedious chore that few drivers completed into a simple, efficient process with high driver adoption. And with photographic evidence of what you collected, conversations with customers become a whole lot easier as well.
Increase driver productivity
A big focus for waste haulers is often helping drivers increase their productivity. By allowing each driver to do more each day, you are able to increase revenue without the need for more people and trucks.
Consider how you can remove barriers to productivity for drivers, so productivity goes up without them having to work harder or longer. It’s a much more sustainable strategy, financially and retention wise.
On residential routes in particular, returning for missed pick-ups is a huge productivity drain for drivers. A focus here can drive significant productivity improvements. Having a fully integrated in-cab solution and back-office solution is key.
With a connected platform in place, your team can push back on customer requests for a go-back where the container wasn’t out, showcasing photographic evidence of the missed pick-up. And where collections were actually missed, dispatchers can quickly reschedule pick-ups or assign helper routes to maintain productivity and keep customers happy.
Increase route density
Another way we’ve found to increase waste hauling revenue is to increase route density. If your trucks are passing prospective customers on their daily routes, that’s an opportunity you shouldn’t miss. It may be as simple as sending marketing communications to businesses that are in close proximity to your existing routes, or you may go as far as offering more competitive pricing to customers that are easier for you to serve.
As you bring new customers on and route density increases, you’ll need to look at optimizing and rebalancing route plans. That’s why Routeware offers route optimization tools designed to intelligently sequence and balance stops as part of our platform. By distributing work more effectively across routes, haulers can accommodate growth in customer numbers using fewer trucks and staff.
Increase customer spend
Our final recommendation is around customer experience, a particular focus of our company. With over 65% of customer interactions in North America now being digital, it is critical that haulers engage and transact with their customers online and on mobile. We see this not as an unwelcome cost for haulers, but as a great opportunity to increase revenue in waste hauling operations.
Indeed, a great online experience will help waste companies to attract new customers, as businesses and residents look for haulers that offer efficient, easy to use services.
Additionally, more sophisticated online tools that let customers self-sign-up to new services encourages existing customers to buy more of your services — and makes it quicker and easier for you to manage their orders.
About Routeware
Investing in the right technology is essential, and Routeware’s next-generation technology is shaped by real-world user feedback and is built to deliver tangible results. At Routeware, our dynamic team of innovators and problem-solvers is committed to developing solutions that optimize operations, increase efficiency, and maximize your revenue. We’re driven by a passion for customer success, and we believe our technology can help you unlock new levels of profitability. We encourage you to discover the Routeware difference.
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*This article originally ran as a Waste360 featured article. To view the original, please click here.*
