3.1x more pipeline than referrals alone for a growing freight brokerage
A freight brokerage had hit the ceiling of referral-led growth. We built an outbound motion targeting shippers in their strongest lanes — and gave their closers a full calendar instead of a cold-call list.
Target audience: Logistics and procurement leads at shippers in the brokerage's strongest lanes
- Qualified meetings / month
- 22
- Pipeline vs. referrals
- 3.1x
- To first booked lane
- < 30 days
- Campaign window
- 60 days
Illustrative example. The engagement is anonymised and the figures are representative of a typical campaign over 60 days rather than a client-approved result.
The problem
The brokerage grew on relationships and referrals — a great foundation, but one that capped how fast it could scale. New business depended entirely on who the team already knew.
The reps were excellent on the phone and poor at prospecting. Asking closers to build their own lists meant both jobs were done badly, and quiet quarters had no lever to pull.
The strategy
Rather than chase every shipper, we targeted only the lanes where the brokerage was genuinely competitive on capacity and service level. Being the obvious right answer in a narrow slice beats being an option everywhere.
Messaging was built around capacity, service levels and on-time performance — the things a procurement lead is actually measured on — instead of generic cost-savings claims that every broker makes.
The execution
We built fresh, verified lists of shippers by lane, refreshed per campaign rather than recycled, to keep bounce rates low and protect sending reputation.
Campaigns ran from dedicated warmed domains. Replies came to us first: we qualified the lane, the volume and the timing, then handed over only the conversations worth a rep's hour.
The result
The first outbound-sourced lane was booked inside 30 days. Reps went back to quoting and closing instead of hunting.
Across the 60-day window the channel settled at around 22 qualified meetings a month and produced roughly three times the pipeline that referrals were generating on their own.
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