Fleet orchestration helps FMCs optimize operations throughout the vehicle lifecycle and at every phase of fleet management. By harnessing the power of real-time data visibility and telematics, managers can make data-driven decisions that guide the organization toward success. Orchestration software empowers fleet managers to track the most important metrics, providing the data they need to surface insights, identify weaknesses, and adjust strategies as needed.
Essential KPIs for Fleet Orchestration
FMCs could analyze an endless list of factors to improve fleet management. However, some metrics are more relevant and impactful than others. Tracking the right KPIs is essential to optimizing performance, boosting efficiency, and achieving cost savings throughout the vehicle lifecycle.
Below, we explore the essential KPIs for effective fleet orchestration.
On-Time Delivery Rate
Client satisfaction is the key to fleet management success. Happy clients stay with your company long-term and bring others along with them, while clients with less-than-ideal experiences do the opposite. Ensuring timely deliveries is crucial for customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, and long-term success. Late deliveries can lead to penalties, lost business, and a poor reputation, making this a key metric for fleet performance.
But on-time delivery isn’t a stand-alone factor in fleet management. Route optimization, driver scheduling, vehicle availability, and more contribute to timely service. Fleet orchestration not only tracks this data but also utilizes automation to ensure all moving pieces fit perfectly together. Should a disruption affect delivery, fleet orchestration alerts managers and provides alternative options (like reassigning vehicles or drivers, rerouting vehicles to avoid delays, etc.) that ensure on-time delivery and customer satisfaction.
Cost per Mile
Fuel costs, maintenance, and route efficiency contribute to cost per mile (CPM). Effectively managing this metric helps FMCs achieve their desired KPI, ensuring operations remain financially sustainable.
CPM directly impacts profitability. By using fleet orchestration technology to manage the contributing factors of CPM, teams identify redundancies, oversights, waste, and other weaknesses that add to the operating costs of fleet assets, including
- Fuel efficiency and consumption, which is impacted by route planning and driver behavior
- Maintenance costs that can be reduced with predictive maintenance planning
- Vehicle size and type, highlighting the importance of appropriate vehicle assignment
When vehicle and fleet data is automatically gathered, organized, and analyzed in real time, FMCs can reduce the CPM of each vehicle while maintaining service and quality.
Vehicle Uptime
Vehicle availability and reliability determine how well an FMC can meet client demands. Frequent breakdowns or unplanned maintenance issues disrupt schedules and increase costs, making vehicle uptime a critical KPI.
Fleet orchestration plays a major role in maximizing uptime, specifically through predictive maintenance. Tracking vehicle telematics paints a holistic picture of vehicle health by tracking specific metrics, including
- Tire pressure
- Fuel consumption
- Engine diagnostics
- Speed
- Idling time
- Harsh braking or other unsafe driver behavior
Through fleet orchestration software, predictive maintenance is automatically scheduled to fix vehicle issues before they ever occur. Instead of taking a reactive approach to maintenance that results in costly, unexpected downtime, orchestration allows FMCs to schedule maintenance and repairs while extending the lifecycle of every asset. When downtime is planned, fleet managers ensure fleet availability for the client, mitigating disruptions in delivery and service.
Driver Utilization
Drivers play a massive role in the success of any FMC. Efficient, accurate scheduling and workload distribution maximize driver safety and productivity. Underutilized drivers increase costs, while overworked drivers might cause safety concerns and burnout. Balancing driver utilization improves compliance, performance, and, as a result, client satisfaction.
In addition to scheduling, fleet orchestration can track driver safety and behavior, critical elements of an effective fleet management approach. Measuring accident and incident rates and driver behavior (like harsh braking, sudden acceleration, swerving, etc.) highlights fleet safety performance and ensures drivers meet safety standards.
Fleet orchestration enhances driver scheduling and utilization by delivering end-to-end visibility for FMCs. With real-time data visibility, these tools automatically alert fleet managers of schedule and delivery changes and provide actionable steps to ensure on-time delivery. Suppose a driver is suddenly unable to complete their shift (for example, due to an accident or illness). In that case, fleet orchestration replaces that driver with an available team member and, if necessary, a replacement vehicle. It can also reroute the new driver if a more efficient route becomes available.
Orchestration empowers FMCs with unprecedented agility. It allows them to maximize every resource, including drivers, while maintaining delivery and service without impacting costs.
Total Cost of Ownership
Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) considers all expenses related to a fleet, including vehicle acquisition, maintenance, insurance, fuel, depreciation, and remarketing costs. Managing TCO helps businesses make informed decisions about fleet size, vehicle replacement strategies, and other factors to reduce long-term expenses.
Because TCO is a compilation of various metrics, fleet managers need orchestration tools to ensure all pertinent data is in one location, visible, and updated in real-time. With that information consolidated into a single dashboard, teams can better analyze the data and use it to make informed decisions that lower TCO without sacrificing service, quality, or the client experience.
The Role of Fleet Orchestration in Fleet Management
Fleet managers are tasked with collecting and analyzing endless fleet data and using that data to guide organizational decisions. You need real-world solutions that help you and your teams maximize every piece of data to enhance your fleet management operations.
The Ridecell platform centralizes and visualizes key KPIs and metrics to empower better decision-making throughout the vehicle lifecycle. Our orchestration solution provides end-to-end visibility and real-time data analysis that supports informed decision-making for every aspect of fleet management.
- A Centralized Data Dashboard that consolidates data from disparate systems into a single location
- Real-Time Analytics and Alerts that help fleet managers make proactive, agile decisions to keep operations running smoothly even when disruptions come your way
- Predictive Insights that automate fleet management tasks and provide solutions to problems before they arise
- Integration with Telematics to connect vehicles, drivers, vendors, and internal operations, enabling instant communication so all parties work from the same up-to-date information
The Ridecell platform integrates and visualizes fleet data to uncover insights and identify gaps in your fleet management approach that are holding you back. Our tools deliver end-to-end visibility so you can effortlessly track –– and act on –– relevant KPIs to grow your business.
Modernize your fleet management organization today. Gather, organize, and analyze your data, then use it to optimize every element of fleet management. Click here for a demo or to learn more.