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How to be a Great Truck Driver Recruiter

Truck driver recruiters are some of the most important people within their organizations. If they are ineffective at their job, the company will have trucks sitting “on the fence” and not on the road earning revenue. Follow these steps and you will know how to be a great truck driver recruiter.

  1. Master Your Process 
  2. Understand Social Media Marketing for Trucking Companies 
  3. Learn the Art of Persuasion 
  4. Stay Organized and Be Prepared 
  5. Stay in Touch With Potential Drivers
  6. Remain Transparent Through the Hiring Process

Truck driver recruiter grabs red wooden figure to symbolize making a new hire.

Master Your Process

You will not be able to efficiently hire truck drivers if you do not have your process mastered.

How are you going to reach out to recent applicants if you do not know where their information is kept? How can you hire a new driver if you do not know how to send them the necessary paperwork and make sure it is all properly filled out?

If you are reading this and have been working at the same company for a long period of time, this tip may feel like a waste of time. However, each company has a different process. It can be easy to overlook this step when you start a new position.

Mastering the entire process is equivalent to mastering the fundamentals of any sport.

Just like you can’t expect to lace them up on Sundays without first mastering the basics, you can not be a great driver recruiter without first mastering your hiring process.

Understand Social Media Marketing for Trucking Companies

Nearly 100% of all truck drivers in the country are members of social media. Effective social media marketing allows for your company to reach all of these drivers, build your company brand, and connect with other people in the industry.

Because social media is so effective at generating driver applicants and promoting your company, it is likely an integral part of your carrier’s strategy.

A great truck driver recruiter understands the fundamentals of social media marketing. They do this because they want to understand where the drivers are coming from, how the driver came to apply, and what is reasonably expectable from a campaign.

Even if you are not responsible for running social media campaigns, you should learn how campaigns work.

Learn the Art of Persuasion

The red figure of a person influences a crowd of people. Expressing your own opinion, turning to your side. Mastery of persuasion, propaganda, influence on the masses. Warming up the mood of the crowd

Truck driver recruiting is a sales position. The key to being successful at sales is learning how to persuade people to act.

You rarely come across a driver applicant that has fully committed to working for your company after applying.

Drivers need to be persuaded to drive for your company.

The driver shortage has created a world where truck drivers are fielding multiple offers at once. Where the driver decides to work comes down to which company is the most persuasive.

If you want to learn how to become more persuasive as a driver recruiter check out this article:

5 TIPS FOR DRIVER RECRUITERS TO BE MORE PERSUASIVE

Stay Organized and be Prepared 

Truck driver recruiting is a constant juggling act. If you are disorganized and/or unprepared you will miss out on opportunities to hire drivers for your company.

If you are organized you will be able to manage applications coming in from multiple lead sources, keep track of all the meetings you set up, and submit the necessary paperwork for each driver.

You need to be over-prepared for each interview with individual drivers. At the start of an interview, you may think a driver applied because they are interested in a pay raise, and then find out that they had a poor experience with previous management.

If you enter the interview only prepared to discuss how drivers are paid at your company, then you won’t be fully prepared to talk about company culture. Sure you could discuss it off the top of your head, but you won’t have all the content necessary to show off your company culture.

Staying organized and being prepared will make sure that you interact with as many drivers as you can and can answer all of their questions.

Stay in Touch With Potential Drivers 

The hiring process can be lengthy, especially if a driver is applying to multiple companies. You must stay in touch with drivers that are in your hiring process.

Every day, Monday through Friday, you need to contact all of your potential drivers.

When you contact drivers you should be checking in to see if you can help them in any way. The key is to stay on the driver’s mind.

Remembering to contact drivers every day can be challenging. Using a quality ATS will help you stay organized and make it easy to contact each driver.

Wooden man shows with hand text Stay In Touch concept on wooden block

Remain Transparent Through the Hiring Process

You need to be transparent with the truck driver through the entire hiring process. Do not over-promise the good aspects of your company and hide the bad aspects.

Be upfront with the drivers about possible areas of miscommunication and elements of the job the driver may not enjoy.

It may feel counterintuitive to share negative information with the driver, however, it actually builds trust between you and the driver. The transparency establishes that you are an honest person.

This does not mean that you should focus on the negatives. Share the things about the job that the driver may not like, but then show that the positives outweigh the negatives.

Truck drivers will be more likely to believe you on how great the position is if you are honest about some of the downsides.

Truck driver recruiters are essential to every trucking company in the country. Also, the better you are at driver recruiting the more money you will make. Follow this guide and you will know how to be a great truck driver recruiter.

The Ultimate Guide to Attract Quality Truck Drivers Online

Quality truck drivers are at the highest demand they have ever been. There are simply not enough of them around. The good news is that 100% of all quality drivers can be reached online, the bad news is that more carriers than ever are competing to attract quality truck drivers.

Here is the ultimate guide to attracting QUALITY truck drivers online:

  1. Building a Strong Facebook Presence 
  2. Driver Testimonials and Creating Content for Drivers
  3. Job Board Management
  4. Champion Cunning Edge Technologies 
  5. Search Engine Optimization
  6. Geotargeting for Driver Recruitment

Quality truck driver wearing a protective mask while driving his truck.

Build a Strong Facebook Presence

96% of all adults are Facebook users. Using this statistic, it is fair to say that 96% of all quality truck drivers are Facebook users as well.

If you have not started building a presence on the social media platform you need to. Last year during 2020, the platform saw increased engagement because everyone was locked down and had nothing to do.

The first step to building a strong Facebook presence is to create your company page. As you are building your company page make sure to include all of the information required to contact you and plenty of quality images.

Once your page is built, use that page to join as many relevant groups as possible.

Take time each day to interact with all of the groups that you have joined. Do not treat the groups as a place where you only post your job ads.

You should be posting the driver content (more on that in a moment) that your company is creating, answer any questions posed by drivers, and any interesting articles.

Think of the groups as a place for you to show off your company’s personality.

In addition to building a professional company page and interacting within groups, you need to be running a continuous Facebook advertising campaign.

It may leave a sour taste in your mouth having to pay for these ads every month, however, it is necessary. Facebook makes its money from ad-revenue, so they have built their algorithms in a way that caps your audience reach on free posts.

Your Facebook ads should promote everything from available job listings, newly created content, and any company milestones.

Advertising on Facebook is a complicated task, but if it is done correctly, you can reach any quality truck driver you want at a cost-effective rate.

magnifying glass looking at Facebook for business page.

Driver Testimonials and Creating Content for Drivers

If you speak with any quality truck driver and ask them about their experiences with recruiters, they are bound to have at least one horror story. Because the industry moves so fast and information changes rapidly, drivers feel like they are always being lied to by recruiters.

Truck drivers trust other truck drivers more than anyone else in the industry.

You need to create content that tells the story of what it is like to work for your company from the perspective of your truck drivers.

Video testimonials from your longest-tenured truck drivers are the most effective content at convincing quality drivers to apply for your company. Quality truck drivers that are researching your company want to hear from your current truck drivers.

In addition to testimonials, you should be creating “day-in-the-life-of” videos. These videos tell the story of an average day for your truck drivers.

Finally, create content that covers any driver celebrations your company throws. Quality truck drivers want to see that they will be properly appreciated if they decide to work for your company.

Job Board Management

Many carriers are hesitant to advertise their jobs on job boards because they have been burned in the past. It makes sense to be hesitant. Advertising on job boards has become more and more expensive and there is no guarantee which job board will perform the best.

However,

Job boards remain one of the best places to attract quality truck drivers.

The entirety of people you reach on job boards is active job seekers. This is opposed to reaching a mix of passive and active seekers advertising on other platforms.

The time it takes to hire an active job seeker is much shorter than the time it takes to hire a passive job seeker. This shorter time to hire means your trucks are on the road longer, earning you more money.

The most common mistake that carriers make when using job boards is spending all of their ad-spend on one board. They will place all of their eggs in one basket.

You need to have your job opening on as many job boards as possible at the start of the month. Then as the month goes on closely monitor to see which board is getting your ad the most views. Finally, allocate the majority of your ad-spend to the top-performing board for the end of the month.

Reset your ad spend at the start of the next month. The top-performing job board will change from month-to-month.

Words We Are Looking For You On Yellow Background. Job Board.

Champion Your Cunning Edge Technology

Does your company use cunning edge technology to make your company as efficient as possible? If so you need to show it off!

Quality truck drivers want to work for a company that uses new technology to make the drivers’ lives easier. They also want to work for a company that frequently gets new trucks.

An example of innovative technology making drivers’ lives easier is logistics software shortening driver routes and increasing their home time.

Driveteks has a client in Salt Lake City that runs loads to Denver every day. Instead of having their drivers make the 8-hour trip there and 8 hours back, they used their logistics software to team up with a company from Denver that runs loads to Salt Lake.

The drivers for the Salt Lake company and the Denver company meet at the halfway point, switch loads, and return home for the night. Each load gets where it needs to go, the drivers drive the same amount of miles, and everyone sleeps in their own bed.

If your company is using technology like in the example above, leasing new trucks, and/or any other new technology you need to make sure driver applicants are aware.

Quality truck drivers want to work for companies that will make their lives easier.

Search Engine Optimization

You can not expect to attract quality truck drivers to apply to work for your company if the drivers can not find you online.

Search engine optimization is the process of making your company findable on the internet. When done properly, you will rank for the search terms that drivers are looking up.

There are three corners to the SEO Triangle: content, technical, and links.

Your company website must be technically sound, have engaging content, and link to relevant sources and have backlinks to your site.

SEM Rush, Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, and Ubersuggest are all excellent tools for you to use to monitor your site’s SEO presence.

Check out the beginner’s guide to SEO if you are unfamiliar with search engine optimization.

Geotargeting for Truck Driver Recruitment

Today’s technology enables recruiters to specifically target niche demographics of potential drivers.

Geotargeting is a location-based advertising strategy. You choose a specific target location and pay to send your ads to the people within that geographical location.

Carefully placing your targets where quality drivers frequent guarantees your ads will be seen.

You should be placing your geotargets at truck stops along your routes, local CDL schools, hiring events, and even competitor truck lots.

Pushpin on map that symbolizes geofencing for truck driver recruitment

Truck driver recruiting is taking place online more than ever before. Companies are realizing that they can directly advertise to the drivers they want at a cost-effective rate. Follow this guide and your company will know how to attract quality truck drivers online.

What are your strategies for attracting quality drivers online? Comment below!

Top 5 Driver Recruiting Techniques for 2021

The trucking industry saw its typical driver recruiting techniques flipped on its head in 2020. Last year the industry had to rapidly adapt and implement web-based recruiting strategies.

These web-based driver recruiting strategies are not going anywhere, even as in-person events become normal again. Because of this, here are the top 5 driver recruiting techniques for 2021:

  1. Facebook Advertising
  2. Content Creation for Driver Recruiting
  3. Job Board Management 
  4. Streamline the Hiring Process
  5. Hiring Dedicated Specialists 

Turning the page from 2020 to 2021.

Facebook Advertising for Truck Driver Recruiting

Over 96% of today’s truck drivers are Facebook users. There is no other platform on the planet that can make such a claim.

Where else are you going to be able to reach this many drivers? This question is rhetorical of course.

Before 2020 Facebook was one of the top driver sources. However, thanks to restrictions imposed to prevent the spread of COVID-19 Facebook engagement skyrocketed last year. People had nowhere to go and nothing to do. So they hopped on Facebook.

Last year the overwhelming majority of truck drivers all increased their Facebook habit. These habits are not going away.

What does all of this mean?

Facebook has become the best place to recruit truck drivers.

Expert Facebook advertisers can promote your job positions to your desired demographic. No longer do you need to take a ‘spray and pray’ approach, hoping that some driver in your demographic will stumble upon your booth at a recruitment fair.

For a reasonable rate, your company can advertise to nearly the entirety of your driver demographic. Facebook advertising allows your company to reach the maximum amount of drivers without wasting a cent of ad spend.

Content Creation for Driver Recruiting

vector illustration of content creatin

Creating content for truck drivers to consume online is essential for recruiting in 2021. Content creation enables you to tell your story to truck drivers.

Quality truck drivers are going to research your company online before they ever apply. If you are not creating your own content truck drivers are going to read what other people are saying about you.

Control your own narrative. Create content.

There are three different types of content. Content that generates awareness, content that gets the driver to consider working for you, and content that gets the truck driver to apply.

If you want to learn how to create effective content check out this article:

Guide to Content Creation for Driver Recruitment

Job Board Management

Many truck driver recruiters will cringe at the idea of using job boards. Which is fair. We have all wasted money on boards that promise us results.

However, this does not change the fact that job boards are one of the best sources for driver applications.

Like the rest of us, one of the first places that truck drivers go to look for a new job is job board websites. Plus, the drivers on job boards are actively seeking a new position. It will take less time to get these drivers hired as opposed to passive job seekers.

The key to using job boards is to not rely entirely on one board.

You need to be posting on all of the job boards and closely monitoring the performance of each board. Each month, a different board will outperform the others.

You need to quickly identify which board is performing the best and then allocate the majority of your ad-spend to that job board.

Closely monitoring the job boards and allocating ad-spend frequently will flood your ATS with truck driver applicants.

Streamline the Hiring Process

The entire hiring process, from application through orientation, can be streamlined with the usage of technology.

Companies like Tenstreet and TruckRight offer software that enables truck drivers to only enter their information on one form and auto-populate all of the required documentation. Also, you can quickly verify previous employment and see any past safety violations of applicants.

Those same companies offer digital learning management software (LMS). Learning management software makes it possible for a truck driver to go through your company’s orientation anywhere in the country.

Streamlining the hiring process not only will improve your company’s efficiency but will also help you hire more drivers.

Truck drivers are more likely to be persuaded to come work for you if it takes little work for them to become employed.

Streamlining Word Road Improve Efficiency

Hiring Dedicated Specialists

Recruiting truck drivers is a full-time job. Driver recruiters need to spend their time calling applicants, interviewing them, convincing the drivers to accept the job, completing the necessary paperwork, conducting orientation, running retention programs, etc.

Digital driver lead generation is also a full-time job. Driver lead generation online takes constant job board management, staying up to date on the algorithms of different social media platforms, content creation, A/B testing, brand management, etc.

Your recruiters do not have enough time in a day to generate leads online. People who focus on lead generation do not have enough time to hire truck drivers.

Hire dedicated specialists.

Lead generation specialists will flood your ATS with driver applicants wanting to work for you now. Driver recruiting specialists will constantly be hiring new drivers, keeping your trucks on the road.

Just because 2020 is in the rearview mirror does not mean that the industry changes last year brought are also a thing of the past. 2021 will only further cement these online trends. Follow the top 5 driver recruiting techniques for 2021 to stay ahead of the curve and hire the drivers you need.

5 Tips For Driver Recruiters to be More Persuasive

At its core, truck driver recruiting is a sales position. You are selling your company to potential drivers. To effectively sell, you need to be persuasive. Here are the 5 tips for driver recruiters to be more persuasive:

  1. Cater the Value Proposition to the Specific Driver
  2. Start With Small “Yes’s” And Work Your Way Up
  3. Mirroring the Driver’s Body Language
  4. Make the Process as Easy as Possible
  5. Share the Positives and Negatives of the Position

Man writing Persuasive Techniques in a note.

Cater the Value Proposition to the Specific Driver

Your trucking company may offer drivers routes that have them home nightly, competitive pay, and a rent-to-own partnership for drivers.

Each of these offerings is going to attract different people.

A younger driver, one without a family who hasn’t rooted down yet, may e more attracted by your company’s pay. This younger driver is not as concerned with being home nightly

On the other hand, an older driver that has young kids and is married is more than likely going to value the home time over everything else.

A truck driver with aspirations of becoming an owner-operator will want to take advantage of your rent-to-own procedure.

As the driver recruiter, you need to determine what the motivation is of the driver you are recruiting early in communication. Then cater your value proposition to that driver’s preferences.

Catering - words from wooden blocks with letters, making or serving food catering concept, top view gray background

Start With Small “Yes’s” And Work Your Way Up

Asking a truck driver to uproot their lives and start a new career with your company is a big ask. It can be daunting for the driver to say yes to such a proposition.

Instead of starting the conversation with the ‘big ask’, start by asking from small yes’s.

An example of a ‘small yes’ is, “Will you watch this video we made of our company culture?” That question is an easy task for the driver to complete and will get them to say yes.

Studies have proven that building up agreement has a lasting effect. Getting truck drivers to start saying yes in your conversation will increase your likelihood of hiring them.

Mirroring the Driver’s Body Language

The scientific term for mirroring is “limbic synchrony” and it is wired into our brain thanks to mirror neurons.

Using this technique makes the driver subconsciously feel like you are their friend because you are acting just like them.

Mirroring is the act of copying the body language of the person you are conversing with. This technique is highly effective at building trust with a person you are meeting for the first time.

If you are interviewing a potential truck driver, start by observing how they position themselves. Then slowly begin to position yourself with the same body language.

Also, mimic the truck driver’s gestures, tone of voice, and talking pace. Make sure to avoid mirroring any accents, as this can be seen as disrespectful.

Stanford-Northwestern-INSEAD study found that people who used mirroring in a negotiation closed more deals and got better results for all parties involved.

Make the Hiring Process as Easy as Possible

Truck driver recruiters are going to be able to hire more drivers if the hiring process is quick and painless. Truck drivers are more likely to say yes to work for your company if it does not require a huge amount of effort.

This is common sense. When someone asks you to do them a favor, are you not more likely to say yes if it does not take up any of your time?

If the driver you are trying to hire has to jump through hoops, struggles to get a hold of anyone in the company, and has to submit multiple forms by hand then they are going to be less likely to work for your company.

Use online tools to help automate this process. If a driver only has to fill out their information one time that will make the process much easier. Also, make sure to remain in consistent contact with the driver throughout the hiring process.

Illustration of lightbulbs act as metaphor to show that easy gets results

Share the Positives and Negatives of the Position

Truck drivers will call baloney if you try to tell them that working for your company is all sunshine and rainbows.

And they are right to do so.

There is no such thing as a position that is all good. Your position will inevitably have some downsides.

Share the downsides with the truck driver.

Being upfront about the negatives may feel contradictory. However, it actually helps you build trust with the driver. Trust is a key piece to successfully hiring drivers.

The trick to this strategy is to always end on a positive note. Ending on a positive note tells the driver that the positives of the position outweigh the negative.

The best truck driver recruiters are master persuaders. Follow these 5 tips to become more persuasive and start hiring more drivers.

Have your own persuasive technique? Comment below!

Where Truck Driver Referral Programs Fall Short

Referral program speech bubble

Truck driver referral programs are often praised as the most effective recruiting strategy for small to mid-sized carriers. Referral programs are impactful for carriers, however, they are not perfect.

Here is where driver referral programs fall short:

No Referrals When Expanding to a New Location

Has your company grown to a point that you want to start a new location in a new part of the country? That is excellent news.

A driver referral program will not help you find drivers in your new area.

Let’s say, for example, your original location is located in West Jordan, UT and you are expanding into Springfield, MO.

None of your drivers are going to know people who live in Springfield Missouri. So how can they possibly refer you to new drivers?

If you expand to a new location and plan on using referrals as your main source of applications you will struggle.

A young man with outstretched arms, shrugging his shoulders, says: I don't know. Isolated on a gray background.

Your Drivers Have A Limited Network

Smaller carriers that employ 10 – 50 truck drivers have a limited network of potential drivers they can reach with a referral program.

Let’s say a company has 50 truck drivers and each driver knows 5 people looking for a new position. That is only 250 possible applications your program could generate. 250 applications is the best-case scenario.

I know you are probably thinking that once you start hiring some of those 250 applications the pool of potential drivers grows. However, the new drivers hired are going to have the same network as the person who referred them.

This is a simplified example and the network your company has access to will always be changing.

Yet, even though it is changing, your network is limited.

Beware of Referral Spamming

Truck drivers are smart people. If you are offering a significant bonus for every referral, some of your drivers are going to figure out how to game the system.

Your truck drivers will find a way to earn as many bonuses as possible.

Now, this is not a problem if your company is making quality hires from these referrals. However, the problem comes in when drivers begin referral spamming.

Referral spamming is when truck drivers are submitting as many referrals they can find, without caring about the quality of the referral.

Drivers will connect on social media, or at a truck stop, and refer a person that they barely just met, even if they know that person is a notorious job hopper.

Do not let these shortcomings scare you away from utilizing truck driver referral programs. There are far more positives than negatives with referral programs. The purpose of this article is to shine a light on things you need to be aware of when using this strategy.

The best way to avoid these shortcomings is by not relying entirely on referrals to make all of your hires. Generating leads from Facebook advertising and other digital media sources will allow your company to keep calling quality leads when the referrals dry up.

7 Questions Trucking Companies Must Ask About an Applicant Tracking System

Small carriers may be able to operate and recruit truck drivers without an ATS. However, as companies grow to be mid-sized and beyond they need to purchase an ATS to manage their driver applications. Here are the 7 questions trucking companies must ask about an applicant tracking system.

7 questions to ask:

  1. What is the Price of This System?
  2. Can You Use it to Contact Potential Truck Drivers?
  3. Will you be Able to Speed up Your Process? 
  4. How Easy is it to Use?
  5. Does the ATS Provide any other Tools?
  6. Can You Easily Visualize Past Data?
  7. Can Your Driver Recruiting Agency Send Leads to the ATS?

What is the Price of This System?

Service price symbol. Hand turns a cube and changes the words 'service' to 'price'. Beautiful orange background. Business and service price concept

This question may be the most obvious of all seven questions. Of course, you are going to try and figure out the price of any new system you need to purchase.

However,

There are many different pricing models used by companies. Pricing models include:

  • Cost per user
  • Cost per number of employees
  • Cost per hire
  • Cost per feature
  • A flat fee charged either monthly, quarterly, or yearly

Before you sign any contract, make sure to read the fine print. Some companies are going to try and charge you for things like support and employee training.

Can You Use it to Contact Potential Truck Drivers?

If the answer to this question is “no”, then you need to find another ATS.

Being able to communicate with truck driver applicants via the ATS makes the process significantly easier. Things like unread emails and missed phone calls will be reduced significantly if you can communicate through your ATS

Also, being able to contact drivers through the ATS is going to allow you to reduce the time from application to first contact. The moment the application hits your ATS you will be able to call the truck driver.

The faster you can call driver applicants, the higher your conversion rate will be.

Will you be Able to Speed up Your Process?

In addition to speeding up your time to contact new applicants, your ATS needs to speed up the other steps of your process.

The ATS needs to allow you to collect and file paperwork, collaborate with fellow recruiters, keep the driver informed, and facilitate background checks.

How Easy is it to Use?

make it easy banner. make it easy speech bubble. make it easy sign

An applicant tracking system is not good if none of the employees in the company know how to use it.

Also, keep in mind that some companies may charge you for company training sessions. So if you purchase an ATS that is too complicated and you need multiple training sessions, it can become quite expensive.

On the flip side of that, an ATS that is too simple may not provide all of the features you need. Think of yourself as Goldilocks looking for the “just right” amount of complexity.

Does the ATS Provide any Other Tools? 

Many applicant tracking systems are great at helping you keep track of new applicants and getting people hired. However, some ATSs offer features that go above and beyond.

If you have a large budget and can afford these extra features, they can come in handy.

Tenstreet, for example, offers applications that allow carriers to market to drivers, track their applications, hire them, and make sure the driver is following safety guidelines.

Can you Easily Visualize Past Data?

Looking back at past data is essential to any effective recruitment campaign. Your ATS should enable you to look at past results and see what works.

The truck driver recruiting strategy your company uses needs to be constantly evolving. Strategy evolves by analyzing the data of past campaigns and responding to the market.

If your ATS does not allow you to easily create visuals that depict past campaigns it may be tough to figure out what is working and what is not.

Visual statistics. Data visualization, creative office people and dashboard. Business technology, working programmers vector. Data infographic, digital statistics analysis, dashboard illustration

Can Your Driver Recruiting Agency Send Leads to the ATS?

What good is your applicant tracking system if your driver recruiting agency can not submit applicants to it? If you have to submit the applications by hand after they are sent to you by the agency, you are losing valuable time.

Having a truck driver recruiting agency run your digital advertising and sending the leads they generate to your ATS is the most efficient way to get applicants.

A process where your digital driver recruiting agency feeds leads into your ATS for your recruiters to contact is best. This allows recruiters to focus on recruiting and not worry about anything else.

If you are a small carrier looking to expand into a mid-sized carrier, you will undoubtedly need an ATS. Use the 7 questions trucking companies must ask about an applicant tracking system to ensure you get the right ATS for your growth.

How to Retain Truck Drivers through the Holidays

The holiday season can be a frustrating time for truck driver recruiters. Many of the drivers you hired throughout the year will leave your company to spend this time with their family. If you take the right steps you can retain your truck drivers. Follow this guide and retain your truck drivers this holiday season.

Santa Claus driving a truck. Truck driver wearing Santa Claus and smiling happy on Christmas Day. Workers in transportation and delivery business are working in celebration holidays. Merry Christmas

Offer a Significant Holiday Bonus 

Money talks, it is the oldest trick in the retention book.

It is common for truck drivers to quit their jobs right before the holiday season starts and find new work in January. The promise of a hefty holiday bonus towards the end of the holiday season would help keep drivers from leaving your company.

The holiday bonus is a motivation for drivers to stay with your company and it makes them feel valued by your company.

You must make sure the bonus you are offering is worthwhile. Drivers are more than likely not going to stick around for a $50 Amazon card. Make the bonus big enough that your truck drivers think it is worth it to keep working instead of taking time off.

Throw a Big Company Holiday Party 

A company holiday party is a fun strategy that you can use to retain truck drivers through the holiday season. Who doesn’t love to party?!

Celebrating the end of another year with a large celebration is an incentive for drivers to stay around. However, you need to make the party a great time, it cannot be a mediocre party.

You can throw an excellent party by allowing employees to bring their families, having the event catered, and specifically having a special moment for the children. If the kids of your drivers are looking towards your holiday party every year then the kids will convince your drivers to stay with your company.

Every year at your company party, make sure to designate some time to specifically celebrate the truck drivers in front of the entire company. You have no company without your drivers and the whole company should celebrate them.

Company throws holiday party to retain truck drivers

Provide Paid Time Off for Longest Tenured Drivers

Clearly, you do not need to worry about your longest-tenured truck drivers job-hopping. If they have stuck with your company for multiple years, it is safe to assume they have no plans for job-hopping.

Not only do these truck drivers deserve to be rewarded for their loyalty, but they are also an example for recently hired drivers. This policy will establish a company culture that says it rewards loyalty.

Giving tenured drivers paid time off is a walking example of what can happen for the new drivers if they stick with the company. The new truck drivers will be determined to stay with your company so they earn paid time off.

Extend an Abundance of Gratitude and Appreciation

At the end of the day, truck driver retention boils down to gratitude and appreciation. Truck drivers are like everyone else and want to work for a company that values them.

If you work for a carrier that is unable to afford bonuses, holiday parties, and paid time off you can still retain your drivers. Gratitude and appreciation are free to give away.

Take time out of every day this holiday season to express how much you value your drivers. Also, encourage all of your non-driving employees to do the same.

The Holiday season is a tricky season to navigate for trucking companies. An increased number of drivers begin to job hop this time of year. This adds extra stress to the truck driver recruiter. Avoid this stress by following these tips and retaining your truck drivers through the holiday season.

4 Tips for Recruiting Owner-Operators

Recruiting owner-operators is an enticing strategy for many fleets. This is because the responsibility of the trucks falls on the drivers. Becoming an owner-operator is enticing to drivers that have an entrepreneurial spirit, but the career is riskier than being a company driver.

The risk deters many people from becoming O/Os making it difficult for carriers to recruit them. Follow these 4 tips and your company can begin recruiting owner-operators:

  1. Prioritize Facebook Advertising
  2. Establish Trust in the First Conversation
  3. Embrace the Entrepreneurship of O/Os
  4. Have Patience and be Consistent

Owner-Operator Semi Truck Driver Words 3d Illustration

Prioritize Facebook Advertising

The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association states that the most common age for owner-operators is 36. Also, the OOIDA has found that on average owner-operators have been driving for 20 years.

This information tells you that you are recruiting seasoned truck drivers who are older in age.

69% of U.S. adults use Facebook. Knowing that owner-operators are typically older and Facebook is popular among U.S. adults, it is safe to say you can reach roughly 70% of all owner-operators through Facebook alone.

Facebook advertising has to be your top recruiting priority.

In addition to the majority of owner-operators being on the platform, Facebook’s targeting tools allows you to pinpoint the drivers you want.

Professional Facebook advertisers will be able to use your ad-spend to show your recruiting content to targeted audiences. Only the people you want to apply for your positions will see your ads.

Using Facebook enables your company to not waste a single cent on owner-operators that do not match your company’s demographic requirements.

Establish Trust in the First Conversation

Becoming an owner-operator is a risky endeavor that has great rewards. Due to the risk, owner-operators are extra cautious when taking on work from a new carrier.

Owner-operators do not want to lose money because they trusted the wrong company.

To overcome this, you need to establish your trustworthiness immediately.

Here is how to do it:

Testimonials.

Above all else, owner-operators believe one another. You need to film your current O/Os talking about how much they enjoy working with your company.

If your company is just starting to recruit owner-operators and you do not have any working for you, film testimonials from current employees and company drivers. These testimonials are not as influential as O/O testimonials but they are still effective at establishing trust.

Owner-operators you recruit will trust you if your testimonials are strong.

Building Trust words on a speedometer to illustrate a brand company working to establish a reputation and earning customer loyalty and repeat business

Embrace the Entrepreneurship of Owner-Operators

Truck drivers that transition from being a company driver to an owner-operator are driven by an entrepreneurial spirit.

Owner-operators are motivated to take on higher levels of risk by the idea of being their own boss and potentially earning more money.

This means that treating owner-operators like you treat company drivers is a recipe for failure.

A company culture that lets owner-operators continue to be their own boss and offers growth opportunities is a necessary recruitment tool.

Have Patience and be Consistent

Recruiting owner-operators is a long term action. Rarely are O/Os ready to work for a new company at the drop of a hat.

Throughout the process of recruiting an owner-operator you need to be consistent in your messaging and patient. Give the driver the space they need to decide for themselves after consuming your recruitment content.

Getting impatient and changing your messaging to sound more “attractive” is only going to upset the driver.

Patience and consistency are the best route for recruiting owner-operators. Unfortunately, not all the drivers you speak to are going to be interested in your offer. However, remaining patient and consistent will ensure respect from all prospective owner-operators.

Many carriers find that working with owner-operators is more beneficial than hiring company drivers in certain situations. Working with owner-operators means the carrier has less risk to manage. However, to successfully recruit owner-operators you need to know it is a longer and more expensive process.

How Aging Truck Drivers Impact the Industry

New technology is allowing drivers to go longer without retiring by making the job less physically demanding. This means the average retirement age is increasing. Despite drivers staying on the road longer, driver retirement is the largest contributor to the truck driver shortage.

Aging truck driver crossing the road to retirement.

The Average Retirement Age for Truck Drivers

The truck driver population in America is steadily increasing year after year. Currently, the average retirement age for truck drivers is 62 years old. However, according to the OOIDA, most independent drivers plan on retiring at 67 years of age.

While the average retirement age for drivers is a good estimate, it does not accurately reflect how individual drivers feel about retirement.

There are two trains of thought amongst drivers. Some have the mentality that they will drive until they can no longer physically pull themselves into the cab. Others want to retire as soon as possible.

How Old is the Average Truck Driver

According to surveys conducted by the American Trucking Associations, the average driver age in the for-hire over-the-road truckload industry is 46. Other trucking sectors have an even higher average age.

Roughly 54% of truck drivers on the road today are 45 years or older. The trucking demographic is one of the oldest in the country and only getting older.

Within this decade over one-half of all current truck drivers will be older than the average retirement age.

An average truck driver

How Many Truck Drivers Retire Each Year

It is estimated that between 2019 and 2028 there will be 600,000 truck drivers retiring. That means 66,667 truck drivers will retire every year.

The industry needs to find nearly 70,000 new truck drivers every year to fill the void left by drivers retiring.

Aging Population is Fueling the Driver Shortage

Truck drivers retiring will be responsible for 54% of the driver shortage over the next decade.

The trucking industry needs to find a way to replace truck drivers retiring from the career.

What You Can Do to Attract Younger Truck Drivers

Obviously, the only way to combat drivers retiring from your company is to hire younger drivers to replace them. The number one place you can find young drivers is on social media.

Hiring a professional to manage your social media marketing is the best way to get your company in front of the eyes of younger drivers.

The industry is experiencing a lack of young people signing up to be truck drivers. You are going to need to recruit people to get their CDL and then join your company.

Aging truck drivers can stay on the road for longer because of improved truck technology. However, that is only kicking the can down the road. Truck drivers are going to retire sooner or later and that is fueling the driver shortage.

5 Steps to Use the Holiday Season to Win the New Year

Through the rest of the year until early January, freight demand will continually slow down and drivers will be with their families, not on the road. Truck drivers are intentionally not applying for jobs right now so they can have time off to celebrate the holidays.

Even though drivers are not looking for jobs right now does not mean you can slow down your recruiting effort. This time can be used to set yourself up for a big recruiting year next year.

Here are the 5 steps to use the holiday season to win the new year:

  1. Increase Facebook Advertising
  2. Focus More on Content Production
  3. Cutback on Geotargeting Recruitment
  4. Revise Your Trucking Recruiting Website
  5. Reflect on Previous Year to Improve for the Next

Truck driver recruiter successfully using the Holiday Season to win the new year

Increase Facebook Advertising

Drivers spending time at home, and not in a truck, means that they now have an excess of free time. A large portion of this free time will be filled by scrolling through Facebook.

The essence of digital driver recruiting is getting your company in front of the eyes of potential drivers. If drivers are spending more time on Facebook then you need to spend to get your company on Facebook more.

Drivers are making a list of potential employers and checking it twice.

Make sure your company is on that list by flooding driver feeds with your Facebook advertisements.

Focus More on Content Production

You are going to have more time on your hands during November and December because you will not be hiring as many drivers. Do not waste this time.

The extra time you have on your hands could be spent wisely working on content creation.

You should be filming driver testimonials, recording interviews with upper management, and writing about how great it is to work at your company.

Post this content on social media for drivers to see and they will be more likely to apply for your company once the new year starts. Drivers are not going to apply for companies that fail to sell them on their company culture.

Cutback on Geotargeting Recruitment 

The amount of freight being delivered during the holiday season is lower compared to the rest of the season.

Since there is less freight being delivered around the country, there will be fewer drivers on the road. The locations you are geotargeting are going to be less occupied.

Do not waste ad-spend to target locations where drivers are not going to be.

In an ideal world, you would take the money you cutback from your geotargeting budget and allocate it to your Facebook advertising budget.

Revise Your Truck Driver Recruiting Website

It is best practice to constantly revise your company website to optimize for truck driver recruiting.

You should delete outdated content from your website to make room for the new content you are creating. Also, conduct some keyword research and update your page titles and headers to boost your SEO rankings.

Finally, make sure your website is built to work well on mobile devices. More people than ever are accessing the web from a mobile device, especially drivers.

Reflect on Previous Year to Improve for the Next

Reflect on the previous year to utilize the Pareto Principle

The final thing you should do during this time is to conduct reflection sessions on what worked and did not work during the previous year.

Strategize with your colleagues about how you can all cut out the processes that were not producing results and focus on processes that do produce.

Remember the 80/20 rule. 80% of your results are produced by 20% percent of your actions. The holiday season is a great time to find the 20% of actions producing results.

Truck drivers are not applying for trucking jobs right now. The applications will pick back up in January so you need to be prepared. Follow these 5 steps to use the holiday season to win the new year.