Reading the trade press so the reps do not have to.
Freightmill's buyers announce things in small places: a planning notice for a new depot, a job post for a fleet manager, a line in a regional paper. Reps knew these were the best reasons to call, and spent Fridays hunting for them.
The operations lead set Prowlen to watch planning portals, job boards and twelve trade titles for the 1,400 accounts in their territories. Each Monday, every rep finds a short list of accounts where something moved, with a brief and a draft for each.
The drafts are not what sold us. It was that every line had a link, so I could check it in ten seconds and send it without worrying.
Reps still rewrite about a third of the drafts. Those edits now feed the next week's drafts, and managers read them in the review queue to see where judgement differs.
