What Is Last Mile Tracking?

Getting 90% of people to agree on anything is a huge challenge—it’s as close to consensus as you can reasonably expect to get. So when the data shows that 9 in 10 people want the ability to track their last mile delivery orders, delivery businesses need to take notice. For reference, that’s the same percentage of people who use seatbelts in the US. Saying that everybody is on the same page here is only a tiny exaggeration.

The numbers are well and good of course, but what does that preference for real-time tracking actually mean when you drill down to the details? How are delivery businesses building real-time tracking into their systems, how are they leveraging it, and what impact is it having?

In other words: what is last mile delivery tracking, why does it matter, and what are the benefits of leveraging it for your delivery operations?

Last Mile Tracking: What Is It, and Why Does It Matter?

First things first: what is last mile tracking, and why should you care about it?

There are two elements to the first part of that question:

• Internal delivery tracking: Internally, last mile delivery tracking will involve leveraging a combination of different technologies (GPS, telematics, driver mobile applications, etc.) to visualize truck and delivery statuses over the course of the day. Here, visibility is the name of the game. You don’t just want to be tracking the location of a truck with no context. Rather, you want to have status updates on each job in addition to location data so you can see at a glance whether you’re running late for any individual deliveries along a particular route. 
• Customer delivery tracking: Obviously, you’ll want to curate which information the customer sees—but by and large you should be able to turn around and offer the same visibility to customers that you’re leveraging internally. This means giving them a link in your normal communications cadence that takes them to a branded delivery tracking interface. From there, they can see driver and order info, real-time truck locations, and up-to-the-minute ETAs, all from the comfort of their own devices. 

We’ll dig deeper into the “why” in the next section, but the short answer to why this matters is that it puts you in a position to gain real delivery visibility and manage by exception. In other words, when you can see at a glance that almost everything is going right, you can much more easily drill down on what’s going slightly off-kilter—all while improving customer delivery experience. 

How to Find the Right Real-Time Tracker

Not all real-time tracker set-ups are created equal. After all, visibility isn’t just about having the data—it’s about making sure you can get the right data at the right time without having to hunt for it. Choosing the right real-time tracker helps you do exactly that. 

To make absolutely sure you’re setting yourself up to reap all the benefits of last mile tracking (more on those below), there are few things you need to look for in your technology:

• Go beyond GPS tracking: Find a solution that combines GPS information automatically with status updates to ensure that driver locations are contextualized appropriately. This way, your system can automatically update delivery ETAs for individual stops
• Look for a connected solution: Your drivers will be using a mobile device to send updates back to dispatch—but a separate mobile app from your primary last mile solution is potentially a recipe for silos and disconnect. The goal should be connected logistics processes, and the software should support that goal.
• Think about coverage for other roles out in the field: Do you also need to track the statuses of sales reps or other team members as they follow their routes? What about warehouse loaders who prep the trucks for the drivers? Make sure whatever app you leverage can support you.
• Include tracking as part of a robust customer experience: Customer experience requires real-time tracking, but tracking isn’t the end-all-be-all of a great customer delivery experience. You should be able to automatically roll out a cadence of timely branded alerts and notifications to customers’ phones and emails. They should be able to communicate with you as needed (simply by responding to system-generated messages) and get a quick response. 
• Select a solution that can execute: Visibility is hugely important—but who wants visibility into something that’s not working? The ideal scenario is to have enough visibility to see that the vast majority of your orders are going off without a hitch, so you can focus your attention on the ones that aren’t. That means that when you’re selecting a real-time tracker you need to acknowledge that visibility isn’t the only piece of the puzzle. Rather, you need to find something with a strong track record of improving delivery execution across a variety of metrics. 

It may sound like a daunting task, but the work upfront to find and implement the right real-time tracker can pay off in a big way, even after just a few months. 

Benefits of Effective Last Mile Tracking

When you invest in visibility, what exactly are you investing in? For one thing, you’re investing in improved customer experience. At the same time, you’re also moving your last mile planning and execution towards a smarter and more connected framework. This has a few distinct benefits right off the bat:

• Faster exception management: When the real-time delivery data is right in front of you, you can easily spot exceptions and take steps to put them right before they become a huge issue. This saves time and money. 
• Fewer “where’s my order” calls: When customers can track their deliveries in real time, they don’t need to call in and ask about them. This means less phone time for your team, meaning that you can repurpose those hours for something more value. 
• Improved coordination between teams: Customers don’t have to call in to get information about deliveries—and neither do customer service reps, sales personnel, or anyone else on your team who might need delivery information. This reduces phone time even further, and it improves coordination across the board. 
• Streamlined driver management: Again, drivers are totally connected to you in real time, which means that you can make sure they’re in a position to do their jobs well. If any issues crop up, you’ll know about them instantaneously. 
• Improved audit trails: What happens on the delivery route—really shouldn't stay on the delivery route. Rather, you should have a complete audit trail for every delivery and every delivery run, including digital proof of delivery and location data. The right real-time tracker helps you achieve that, which in turn decreases costly and inefficient paperwork and steels you against false liability claims. 

How Last Mile Tracking Powers End-to-End Logistics Visibility

The above isn’t an exhaustive list of the potential benefits of the right real-time tracker, but it should give you a sense of how this kind of tool—properly implemented—can help you move towards true logistics visibility.

As you modernize your logistics technology stack and your customer delivery experience, real visibility is an incredibly valuable north star. It helps you future-proof processes and ensure that everyone in the organization is singing off the same page of music. Real-time delivery tracking goes a long way in laying a strong foundation for precisely that level of connected visibility across your supply chain and logistics operations.