In the 2025 freight market, the pressure is real. Loads are down, margins are tight, and growth is harder to come by. As a freight broker, you have the power to do more than hope for the best. You can take control of your operations.
Right now, smart brokers aren’t waiting for the market to fix itself. They’re moving forward with:
- Faster quoting, booking, invoicing, and payments
- Enhanced customer service, built into every workflow
- Strong and secure carrier relationships
- Increased workflow efficiencies across every team
- Consistent margin protection
How are they doing all of this? With a powerful TMS, built specifically for their business.
Here are four signs that your current TMS is holding you back, along with questions to help you decide if it’s time for a change.
1. Automation Is Shallow, Complicated, or Nonexistent
If automation in your current system stops at the basics or you’ve had to build workarounds just to make things work, you’re wasting time and exposing your margins. A TMS should automate as much of your workflow as possible, from quoting to payment. And that automation should be easy to customize without relying on developers or IT teams.
Questions to ask:
- Which tasks can we automate completely through our TMS?
- How many workarounds are we using to make our TMS work for us?
- Can we build and adjust workflows in our TMS without IT help?
2. You’re Not Using Data to Make Decisions
Market uncertainty becomes manageable when you have data to guide your actions. Your TMS should help you learn from past performance, spot current trends, and anticipate market changes before they hit your margins. If you’re still making educated guesses or flipping between multiple spreadsheets and tools to get insights, your system isn’t doing enough to help you make smarter, faster decisions.
Questions to ask:
- Does our TMS store and analyze detailed customer and carrier data?
- Does our TMS track quotes, win rates, carrier performance, and lane trends in real-time?
- Are our dashboards relevant, up-to-date, and accessible across teams?
3. Your Tools Don’t Talk to Each Other
If your team is copying data between systems or waiting on status updates, your TMS is slowing you down. A modern TMS should offer pre-built integrations for your accounting and payment platforms, load boards, carrier APIs, CRM, and more. And when you need a new integration, it shouldn’t take months or a custom development team to make it happen.
Questions to ask:
- Does our TMS connect with the tools and software we already use?
- Are the integrations reliable and supported?
- Can we add new integrations easily?
4. You Can’t Get the Support You Need
When you hit a roadblock in your TMS, do you get a fast, helpful answer or a ticket number and a long wait? A great TMS doesn’t only offer fancy software features. It also provides comprehensive customer service. If you’re stuck managing updates or training on your own, it’s costing your team valuable time and resources.
Questions to ask:
- Does our TMS provider offer live onboarding support and always available training tools?
- Can we get help with troubleshooting without having to wait days?
- Does the vendor continuously improve the product based on our feedback?
What You Need Instead
The right TMS can help you grow your business now, not when the market improves. Look for a system that automates your process right out of the box, delivers real-time insights, and connects to every tool you use. Demand a vendor that offers hands-on onboarding, comprehensive training, and responsive support. Most of all, find a TMS created and backed by a team that understands freight brokers.
Tai TMS was built for this moment. It’s designed specifically for brokers who want to move faster, work smarter, serve customers better, and stay profitable, even in challenging market conditions.
Ready to Find a Better Way Forward?
Download our new eBook, “Turn Market Pressure Into a Strategic Advantage“, for an in-depth look at why a powerful TMS built for brokers can be the difference between stagnation and growth in 2025.
