Hey! Without a speck of doubt, Uber is the role model for many taxi businesses that have ventured into the marketplace. Well, as much as Uber is famous for taxi services, it is also famous for logistics transportation and roadside assistance services. As an entrepreneur, you can spread out your business verticals in truck transportation services. So, here is this blog to edify you everything about the tow truck app development.
All about the freight or truck transportation services
As a truck service provider, you will provide transportation services for goods. The shippers will book your services by mentioning the number of goods along with location details. Your fleet will dispatch the goods to the mentioned location. So, there are two types of business models associated with truck services, which we will elaborate on in the upcoming sections. Before that, let us know the benefits of launching the app for the truck business.
Why would you need a Uber like app for truck business?
Launching an app for truck business will save you from hectic management processes. Right from monitoring the vehicle to addressing the queries, you can perform every kind of management activity from the app itself. Uber like app is a famous app solution for truck businesses. There are many features in the app which makes it more helpful for businesses to manage their operations efficiently. We will discuss the features of the app elaborately in this blog.
Steps to check in to develop your trucking app
Pick up a business model
As far as the trucking business is concerned, there are 2 types of business models: aggregator model and individual model. For example, let us assume that you are owning the truck business and need an app for overall management. Another example is you would like to act as a mediator between the shippers and the carriers. The choice is yours.
Spot your target audiences
Here comes the core part of your business, where you will have to find the audiences. Firstly, you must get to know whether there is scope for your business among users, the competitors offering similar services, etc. If the region where you are targeting is already brimming with heavy competition, then you must examine providing something unique, and at the same time, it should be a remedy for the user’s pain points.
Find the app developer
Another core part of every business is finding the app development partner. You can use freelancing platforms to recruit the developers, or straightaway goes for an app development company. After finding the developer, you need to sit back and analyze the projects they have taken up, their pricing packages, etc.,
The recent trend that is booming out is the ready-made app script. App development companies have ready to deploy apps that can be launched immediately after customizations and white-labelling. So, it is a better option to go for ready-made solutions so that you can save more time.
Decide the features to be included in the app
Features of the app play a major role in giving out a great user experience. You must be specific in selecting the features. Know the features that are really important and add them. As your business grows and the trend shifts, you can add extra features. Here is the necessary set of features of the trucking app.
- Shipment details – Through this feature, the shipper can give all the details of the goods along with the location and timing details.
- Schedule bookings – Through this feature, the shipper can schedule their bookings by mentioning the time and date.
- Tracking – The shippers can identify the location/status of orders via the tracking feature effortlessly.
- Integrated payment – The shippers can make the payments by availing of the different payment options available in the app.
- Route optimization – Helps the truck drivers to identify the best routes and also the traffic-free routes for commuting.
- Push alerts – The shippers will get alerts regarding the status of their goods. Likewise, the drivers will also get alerts regarding the shipments.
- Admin dashboard – As an admin, you can perform the management activities like monitoring the trucks, verifying payments, providing support to shippers/drivers via the dashboard.
Cost of developing the trucking app
There is no explicit way to determine the cost as there are many factors involved. However you can reduce the expenses with ready-made solutions such as Uber like app for Trucks. Yet, we can look through the factors to get an idea of how the cost is determined by the mobile app developers.
- The number of platforms you want the app to be launched. For example, launching a mobile app on Android is cheaper than launching an app on iOS. Likewise, the cost differs from platform to platform.
- Again, the number and complexity of the features will also be included while determining the cost because every feature requires a technology stack. For example, for push notifications, Twilio or Push.io is used. For navigation systems, Google Maps and GPS will be used.
- The number of developers and the hourly rate paid to them are again the cost determining metrics. Also, the hourly rate will be varying from one county to another. So, only if you decide on the number of features and the type of platform you can get to know the actual cost of developing your trucking app.
Different monetization models of the trucking business
- Commission fees – If you select the aggregator model, then you will definitely receive the commissions from the carriers registered on your app. Take any business; the commission fees will be the major part of the revenue.
- Paid features – In your trucking app, you can group certain advanced features as paid ones so that you will be another source of revenue through the app.
- Advertising fees – In general, businesses rely on advertising as they provide a huge source of revenue. Also, you must not bombard the app with ads as they might annoy the users.
Wrapping up, this blog will be more of a guide for you to launch the trucking app for your freight business. I hope that every segment of this blog will turn out to be more informative.