Given the rapid advance of technology that we've seen over the past few decades and the many industries it has revolutionized, the frustration of those in the global logistics industry is certainly understandable. In many ways, global logistics seems stuck in the past, still hindered by consistency and control issues that have plagued the industry since the dawn of global trade. 

Many wonder if consistency and control in global logistics is nothing more than a pipe dream. The good news, though, is that — while there are still plenty of challenges to solve — consistency and control are now more achievable than ever, thanks to real-time container visibility and the technologies that make it possible. In this article, we will explore what achieving consistency and control looks like in the global logistics industry, the challenges that have kept most organizations from attaining it, and how real-time visibility solutions can help overcome these challenges. 

What Does Consistency and Control in Global Logistics Look Like? 

In global logistics, consistency and control start with knowing the cargo’s location, when it will arrive, and why delays occurred. At a time when ordinary consumers can track their online purchases with a high degree of accuracy using only their smartphones, this doesn't seem like too insurmountable of a challenge. However, monitoring the location and status of ocean freight is much more complex than tracking domestic shipments, and this type of visibility remains a challenge for many organizations. 

Consistency and control in global logistics also require harmony and efficient communication between individual processes and systems. However, this, too, is often easier said than done. The fact that most organizations rely on a complex combination of manual processes and automated systems makes communication between these processes and systems challenging. 

Effective communication between different processes, systems, and partners is also key to consistency and control. Once again, though, this requires accurate and well-organized data in addition to being standardized between systems and partners.   

The Challenges Standing in the Way 

We've already touched on some challenges preventing greater consistency and control in global logistics. The biggest challenge standing in the way is a lack of accurate, detailed, and standardized data. Let's start with the fact that many logistics organizations still rely on manual data collection and analysis. Besides being wildly inefficient, these manual data collection processes are also highly prone to errors. Even when an organization can manually collect accurate data without too much waste and inefficiency, the data collected tends to be messy, unorganized, and not standardized. Using such data to glean insights that allow for greater consistency and control is often like looking for a needle in a very messy haystack. Trying to use this data to communicate between partners and varying systems that might be looking at an entirely different mess of data is even more challenging. 

Another critical challenge that keeps consistency and control little more than a pipe dream for many in the global logistics industry is the time and expense associated with building automated solutions to replace manual data collection and analysis. Traditionally, building such a solution meant spending years working with a software development firm and often spending millions of dollars in the process — a price tag and timeline that many organizations simply cannot stomach. 

Thanks to VIZION's API-driven real-time container tracking solution, both of these problems are now issues of the past — and consistency and control in global logistics no longer has to be a pipe dream.  

How Real-Time Visibility Provides Greater Consistency and Control 

VIZION provides organizations with a wealth of tracking event data pushed via API automatically to any software system or spreadsheet. Best of all, the data that VIZION provides is the most organized, detailed, and standardized tracking data available today. 

How our industry-leading container tracking solution provides greater consistency and control in global logistics is multi-faceted. For one, VIZION eliminates the need for manual data collection, thus solving all of the inefficiencies and preventing errors associated with this process as well. By standardizing tracking event data shared between different systems and partners, VIZION also facilitates the ease of communication necessary to achieve greater consistency and control. 

Lastly, VIZION's turnkey API solution eliminates the expense and time required to build a custom tracking solution. With VIZION, organizations can create custom container tracking APIs in a matter of days rather than years — for a small fraction of the cost. 

By putting the power of automated, standardized, detailed, and accurate real-time tracking data at your fingertips, VIZION provides global logistics organizations with real-time visibility and far greater consistency and control. To learn more about how VIZION can revolutionize your organization's approach to global logistics, feel free to contact us today!