The work of a freight agent implies many advantages. The main thing is that it is a demand specialty.
However, becoming a freight agent with no experience can be a little tricky. But there are a few simple steps that will set you on the right path to a successful career. Here is what you should do.
1. Start Learning.
Knowing and understanding the shipping industry is essential to becoming a successful broker. Find suitable offline training or take online courses like Freight Broker Training.
You can start right now by clicking on the link to our site
Obtaining this knowledge will help ensure that you are genuinely interested in the field and help you gear your resume. You may also want to check out forums on the topic. There you can ask specific questions to those in the industry and potentially make some connections. It is best if you get knowledge from an expert, a person who has already passed this difficult path.
In addition, you can get a job in a freight brokerage company for an entry-level position. In this way, you will not only gain the necessary experience, but also show your desire to grow and develop in this industry, as well as your willingness to spend time and money on this.
2. Find yourself a few potential Freight Broker partners.
Start with small companies. They are more likely to give a novice agent or broker the opportunity to start a career. Especially when you don’t have your own clients yet. But you should also consider large corporations. On the one hand, they prefer not to hire newcomers. On the other hand, they cooperate with recruitment agents to fill a short-term or contract position. So you will get the necessary experience and be able to add to your resume, albeit temporary, a job in a company with a well-known name. The easiest way to find freight brokers is to Google, and Load Boards.
3. Upgrade your LinkedIn profile to a professional level
Your profile must indicate your education and all the training that you have taken. Knowledge and experience in sales, marketing, negotiation, management, customer service will be an advantage. In addition, the ability to work with basic programs will not be superfluous. Say you had to be hyper-organized and highly communicative in your previous employment. While that could be in a very different field, those skills you learned on that job are essential to becoming a good freight broker.
Use your profile to showcase yourself as a positive person who loves his job and is ready to be a valuable partner for a freight broker.
4. Start building a connection with potential Freight Broker partners
At this stage, you already have a list of freight brokers you are interested in and a professional Linkedin profile. On this platform, you can, for example, find a person who works in one of these companies and make contact with him. It is absolutely normal to ask if the company is hiring new employees and how to become a freight broker or agent in their team. You should try to build this relationship in such a way that as a result you can communicate with this person by phone, video chat or meet in person. During this conversation, explain why you have decided to become a freight agent and what your dreams and goals are. Tell about the specialized training that you have already completed, how you study the market, what you are already doing as a future agent. Let them know that you are ready to start working for a commission from the work performed without risk to their company. Show what you are willing to do for this job.
Go on sending your resume out. Remember, even if a job requires a bachelor’s degree and you only have a broker training certificate, apply anyway. Often job openings don’t get enough applicants, and recruiters have to overlook some of their original desires.
5. Find a subagent.
Let’s say you’ve gone through all the previous steps and still haven’t been hired. Using already known platforms such as Google, Linkedin, loading boards, find a few agents who already work with large freight brokers. Convince them to hire you as a sub-agent. That is, you will be acting under control of the original agent. Unfortunately, the percentage of commission from the work performed is less. But you will start doing what you wanted, get practical skills, knowledge and gain invaluable experience that you lacked. When you have your own clients, you can even continue to do it yourself.
Thus, these are the 5 steps you need to go through to get a job as a freight agent with no experience and no own clients. Follow them and you will succeed.