Presentation Descriptions

BENCHMARKING TRANSPORTATION RATES AND SERVICE
Transportation expenditures account for more than half of total logistics costs. In fact, as a national average, transportation costs consume 6% of corporate revenues. How much are you spending as compared to companies with similar parcel characteristics and delivery standards? How do you know if you are negotiating favorable rates compared to your peers? Whether your distribution operations are in-house or outsourced, a comparison against professional benchmarks can be a valuable tool for determining a logistics strategy. In this session, you will learn how to perform numerical and qualitative transportation benchmarks.

TOP FRUSTRATIONS OF DEALING WITH YOUR PACKAGE CARRIERS
Are you frustrated with FedEx and UPS services and/or representatives? Feel “nickled-and-dimed” with all the add-on charges and annual rate increases? Unresponsive sales reps? Billing problems? Confused by complex carrier agreements? Based on a survey conducted with Parcel magazine, you’re not alone. Attend this presentation to discover practical solutions to the most common frustrations and roadblocks in dealing with your transportation vendors. Presented by former carrier executives and leading industry consultants.

ESSENTIAL NEGOTIATION SKILLS FOR DISTRIBUTION CENTER & SHIPPING MANAGER
Whatever the contract-mail/shipping/printing/fulfillment services, equipment leases, or even your salary raise/promotion-discover the negotiating techniques of professionals. Learn:

• The 4 critical steps to prepare for negotiations
• Probing techniques to better understand the other side’s motivations and objectives
• How to turn the concept of “WIN/win” into real value and savings
• How to overcome stalled or hostile negotiations

Vendors to the industry will also find tremendous value in this presentation. You will learn:

• How to better understand your customer’s perspective
• What your customer is likely thinking and doing during negotiations
• Which common mistakes could cost you the business

TEN PROVEN WAYS TO LOWER YOUR SHIPPING COSTS TODAY
This presentation will help you understand key components of your carrier contracts and provide valuable information to help you even the negotiating playing field. Presented by former carrier executives, learn “insider” information to:

• Understand how most shippers are at a significant disadvantage when negotiating with carriers
• Negotiate the best upfront discounts, contracts & services available
• Identify and reduce the impact of accessorial charges
• Structure your contract to your company’s maximum benefit
• Take advantage of savings through modal optimization
• Use electronic shipping data to improve freight management, audit for savings & influence future rate negotiations
• And much more!

GOING GROUND: FEDEX, UPS & USPS
Are you spending more than you should for shipping services? 68% of all shippers surveyed indicated they have replaced overnight shipping services with ground services. The significantly lower pricing, improved service performance, overnight delivery areas, money-back guarantees and lower fuel surcharges make Ground a wise shipping decision for select packages. But what packages, and what carrier for what package? Presented by leading consultants that represents large shippers in their carrier negotiations, learn:

• What are the service differences between UPS, FedEx, and USPS
• How to negotiate and structure the most effective contract
• How to avoid minimum charges & decrease accessorial charges
• What discounts are available for your volume (rate benchmarking)
• How the mergers and acquisitions are effecting the ground industry
• Common negotiating errors to avoid
• And much more!

CRITICAL CHANGES IN THE PARCEL CARRIER MARKET
If you haven’t evaluated your shipping services in the last 6 months chances are you are spending too much and getting too little. In this seminar, presented by top shipping industry consultants, you will learn the answers to many critical questions including: “Is your contract current with the industry?”; “How are mergers and acquisitions impacting the industry?”; “Are you partnering with the right carrier’s?” Using a combination of expert information and real-life case studies you will obtain advice to reduce your parcel carrier costs 10% or more.

UTILIZING INFORMATION TO LOWER YOUR SHIPPING COSTS
According to a recent Aberdeen survey, few businesses truly understand how much they spend, on which products, and with which service providers. Only half of businesses currently have a formal spending analysis program. Worse yet, firms with formal procedures analyze only about half of their total spending. Attend this presentation to find out:

• Why most shippers don’t have the information they need
• What are the limitations of carrier-provided information
• How lack of spending analysis leads to higher costs
• Techniques & tools for data capture, analysis and auditing
• How to determine benefit between in-house and outsourced auditing
• How information about your shipping & mailing costs can improve your costs, productivity, accounts payable efforts and relationships with service providers

HOW TO MAXIMIZE SERVICE GUARANTEES
Although each of the major carriers offers service guarantees, FedEx and UPS make it very difficult to file service claims for late delivery. Frustrated with stringent carrier claims & tracking policies, as well as the cumbersome processes required to audit shipments for late delivery, most shippers don’t take advantage of money-back guarantees. Attend this presentation and discover:

• How to measure true service levels and hold carriers accountable
• Carrier policies as well as strategies to maximize service refunds with FedEx and UPS
• Techniques & tools for auditing
• How to determine benefit between in-house and outsourced auditing
• How to use POD reports to save money through modal optimization
• And much more!

HOW TO MAXIMIZE VALUE FROM YOUR MAJOR SUPPLIERS
Is your company getting the most value possible from strategic vendors? Learn how leading corporations turn supplier relationships into strategic competitive advantages and how to:

• Negotiate the best rate & service programs
• Motivate vendors to perform at peak levels
• Develop a continuous improvement process for your vendor
• Improve internal and external communication with key vendors
• Establish effective SLA’s and controls to contract management

Vendors to the industry will also find tremendous value in this presentation. You will learn ideas to:

• Differentiate your company from the competition
• Raise your level of involvement and provide more value to strategic customers
• Lower the “cost” of doing business with your customers
• Generate additional revenue streams for your company
• Transition from a “vendor” to a “partner”

PROCUREMENT STRATEGIES: REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL (RFP)
Learn the most effective procurement strategies used by top industry professionals to protect their companies and secure the best deals. Attend this seminar and learn:

• How to form an internal team and write an RFP
• How to structure your RFP into the most effective format and timelines
• Which common RFP mistakes you can avoid
• How vendor collaboration produces the best results
• Important legal inclusions no RFP should be without
• Proposal evaluation and vendor contract management techniques

Vendors to the industry will also find tremendous value in this presentation. You will learn:

• Which RFP’s you should accept and which you should pass on
• To communicate and exercise your “rights” during the RFP process
• Steps to maximize your company’s chances for successful bid acceptance
• How to ensure you get the feedback you need to improve subsequent bid responses

USING CARRIER TECHNOLOGIES AND VALUE-ADDED SERVICES TO MANAGE PARCEL DISTRIBUTION & REDUCE COSTS
Attendees will learn the latest technology and service offerings from UPS and FedEx. We will use real examples of shippers who have taken advantage of value added carriers services to reduce internal costs as well as lower overall shipping expenditures. Shippers will learn how to better integrate these services into their own operations. Special emphasis will be placed on carrier technologies to improve shipment visibility, processing, and invoicing. Shippers will be given information on how to maximize new service offerings to lower shipment costs without sacrificing service to the customer. Learn to:

• Take advantage of free carrier technologies and value added services
• Better manage parcel distribution and increase efficiencies throughout the enterprise
• Lower overall shipping costs and improve carrier service performance

BEST PRACTICES IN PARCEL RETURNS MANAGEMENT
We surveyed shippers to find out just how returns are being processed. Find out what other companies are doing as we unveil the results in this session. Learn how returns are tracked, what return methods are utilized, what are the challenges for returns, what are best practices in returns management, what are chargeback policies, what correlation exists between returns costs/policy and customer retention and more. Returns are big business and are often overlooked area of opportunity to get and keep more customers, maximize and extend the value of goods sold and minimize the impact of returns on profits. Includes best practices by major online retail shippers.

BOOST PROFITS THROUGH EFFECTIVE SHIPPING CHARGE POLICIES
This presentation will reveal the results of a shipper survey of Parcel and Traffic World readers. From these results you will gain valuable insight into the most effective ways to charge back shipping costs. We will discuss tools and techniques to ensure that you are accurately recapturing and passing along these costs to your customers. The proper way of identifying total shipping costs will be explained and some carrier gotcha’s that hurt your bottom line will be exposed. Finally, we will share some new carrier billing options that will help shippers reconcile and chargeback total freight costs.