As we progress further and further into the digital age, it can be easy to lose sight of the fact that practical logistics still play a huge role in many business models. Unless you provide a purely digital service, chances are you will be delivering a physical product or meeting your clientele/consumers in the real world. Beyond this, even digital services often begin with an in-person sales meeting. With this in mind, how can we use drive time analysis to help our service and sales teams make efficient use of their time?
Today, we will be defining drive time analysis, looking at some examples of drive time analysis being used to plan sales and service calls, the benefits that come with drive time analysis, and why these tools can give your business the leg up on the competition.
Drive Time Analysis Definition
Drive time analysis is almost exactly what it sounds like: a tool that analyzes the routes which would need to be taken to drive to various locations. Generally, these analyses start with a central point. Businesses will most likely be using a retail location or office location as their central hub for drive time analysis.
Depending on your individual needs, you may choose to analyze locations which are within certain trip durations. For example, drive time tools can show you what locations are within 5 minutes, 10 minutes, or 30 minutes from your starting location. Your team can then use this location to plan out routes and scheduling for sales and service calls.
Of course, this works in the opposite way as well. Retailers can use drive time analysis to determine how many potential consumers live within certain ranges of their brick and mortar locations. This can allow businesses to pinpoint their marketing campaigns to areas which are most likely to utilize their services.
Using Drive Time Analysis for Sales Planning
Sales is a game of time and money spent vs. money earned. The longer your sales team spends behind the wheel, the less time they are spending making sales pitches and closing deals. This is true whether you are operating out of a central location or even if your team is on the road. Let’s look at an example.
You and your colleague are planning a trip out of state to make sales calls to prospective clients. You have 5 calls to make in the area surrounding your hotel. Before you set a schedule, analyzing drive times to and from all five sales locations will allow your sales team to determine the most efficient order and routing for your day.
Obviously, this exact scenario is unlikely to occur. Yet this concept remains valid for a wide range of sales scenarios.
The Benefits of Location Data and Analysis
Drive time analysis is a subsection of overall location data and analytics. So how can drive time tools help your business? Here are some benefits to adding drive time data to your overall location planning protocol:
Identifying the best sales regions: simply looking at a map and viewing nearby businesses is fine, but drive time analytics pinpoints exactly which businesses are closest in practical terms.
Identifying core consumer bases: similarly, to identify the population which is most likely to become your consumers, drive time analytics is the best option.
Drive time can combine with other location data: information such as dollars spent within certain industries, population data, and much more can be cross referenced against drive times to deliver highly accurate maps of your ideal customer base.
Finding new locations: of course, all of this data can also be used proactively to find that next best location which will bring in new customers. Often times, “location, location, location” can lead business owners to believe that a more expensive property will be more lucrative. With drive time analysis and other location data points, you can determine the true value of potential properties.
Comparing drive times with competing businesses: last but not least, drive time analysis can be done on any competing businesses to determine your strengths and weaknesses within the industry. You may even choose to use this information to target key overlap areas where consumers are within convenient distance of both businesses.
Drive Time Analysis Tools from Clock Tower Insight
At Clock Tower Insight, we turn data into business solutions. By maximizing brand positioning, CX management, moments of influence, and more, we help build our clients’ brands in the short and long term. Clock Tower Insight believes that happy customers equal a happy business. We work closely with clients to tailor their brand from top to bottom in order to maximize positive image, exposure, and sales.
Drive time analysis is just one way we use location data to help our clients identify their strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities. Our site evaluation service is a new addition to our already robust suite of services including brand positioning, market sizing, CX management, and more!
To learn more about how we may be able to help your business grow, read about our 15 plus years of focused experience working with brands such as Starbucks, Kraft, and McDonald’s.