August 4, 2014

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Editor's Analysis & Top Industry News


Sutton_Janice How to Earn a Great Reputation

We are pleased to pub­lish the third install­ment of fleet mar­ket­ing guru Ed Pierce’s monthly mar­ket­ing col­umn A Call to Action (For Fleet Providers). This month’s col­umn is enti­tled ‘Earn­ing a Great Rep­u­ta­tion Through Pro­mo­tion and Edu­ca­tion.’ If you mar­ket prod­ucts to fleet buy­ers, Ed can help you reach those buy­ers with the right message.

Just before leav­ing town last week, our dys­func­tional Con­gress man­aged to cob­ble together a stop-gap High­way Bill, which will keep the High­way Trust Fund sol­vent only until next spring. But some hard deci­sions will have to be made then and fleets are very much affected, no mat­ter how the prob­lem is addressed and finally resolved. NAFA is mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion and will con­tinue to make the posi­tion of fleet pro­fes­sion­als known to leg­is­la­tors. Be sure and keep NAFA apprised of your own posi­tion on this thorny issue.

Jan­ice Sut­ton
Exec­u­tive Editor


M Resort las vegas AFLA 2014 Conference Set to Deliver Outstanding Professional Development

Join Your Fleet Col­leagues in Las Vegas at the 2014 AFLA Annual Conference!

The annual con­fer­ence of the Auto­mo­tive Fleet and Leas­ing Asso­ci­a­tion (AFLA) will be held Sep­tem­ber 7–10, 2014 at the M Resort & Spa Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. The theme for this year’s con­fer­ence is Learn, Inno­vate, Win: Improv­ing Your Odds for Fleet Suc­cess. This is AFLA’s sec­ond trip to Las Vegas, return­ing after a suc­cess­ful con­fer­ence in 2010.

The theme is reflec­tive of AFLA’s ded­i­ca­tion to offer­ing top-notch speak­ers and con­tent for an afford­able con­fer­ence fee and a great return on your invest­ment. Vince Poscente, Wel­don Long, and Scott Bur­rows will all give keynote pre­sen­ta­tions at this year’s con­fer­ence. AFLA is excited to part­ner with these great speak­ers to present key pro­fes­sional devel­op­ment top­ics dur­ing the conference.

READ MORE


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VIDEO: Why You Should Hit the Expo Floor at NAFA I&E

The fleet busi­ness is very much about rela­tion­ships — and fleet pro­fes­sion­als can learn a whole lot by inves­ti­gat­ing what’s hap­pen­ing on the Expo Floor at NAFA I&E.

VIDEO: The Internet of Things
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  Connected Assets, Connected Vehicles, More Data
 

GE Fleet is align­ing with the broader GE goal of con­nect­ing all assets in ‘The Inter­net of Things,’ using Pre­dic­tive Ana­lyt­ics, and bring­ing more value than ever to their customers.


Click here to watch video
VIDEO: Less Speeding for Your Fleet
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  A 95% Reduction in All Speeding for Your Fleet?
 

A pow­er­ful com­bi­na­tion of in-cab real-time ver­bal men­tor­ing with accu­rate real-time speed limit report­ing can lead to a 95% reduc­tion of all speed­ing in your fleet. And less speed­ing means more safety.


Click here to read more



The Fleet Spot


highway NAFA Urges Long-Term Fix to Highway Trust Fund Issue

NAFA Mem­bers’ fleets are major users of the Amer­i­can high­way sys­tem. They face con­ges­tion, poor road con­di­tions, closed bridges, and other obsta­cles that have a direct impact on their effi­ciency and their employ­ers’ bot­tom lines.

Con­gress finally passed a High­way Bill, just before the sum­mer recess and just in time to keep the High­way Trust Fund from going bank­rupt. How­ever, the squab­bling House and Sen­ate agreed only to kick the can down the road by means of bud­getary trick­ery. In the end, the Sen­ate accepted a short-term fix from the House that will keep the High­way Trust Fund sol­vent only until next spring.

READ MORE

connected-vehicles Mark Your Calendar: ‘Connected Fleets USA 2014′

Telem­at­ics for Fleet Man­age­ment USA has evolved to Con­nected Fleets USA 2014′ – Novem­ber 20–21, 2014 — Westin Buck­head, Atlanta, Georgia

The com­mer­cial telem­at­ics indus­try is evolv­ing as merg­ers and acqui­si­tions are diver­si­fy­ing the ser­vices avail­able from telem­at­ics ser­vices providers. The Con­nected Fleets USA 2014 con­fer­ence will gather the most respected opin­ion mak­ers and pres­ti­gious com­pa­nies to ana­lyze the chal­lenges that the indus­try is cur­rently tackling.

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The new Ford Police Interceptor sedan NAFA’s Law Enforcement Group Represents Specially Skilled Fleet Managers

“No other type of fleet has vehi­cles that, as a job func­tion, are being used in such an extreme way, serv­ing and pro­tect­ing cit­i­zens 24–7,” said Robert Mar­tinez, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of the Sup­port Ser­vices Bureau for the City of New York Police Department.

As the Chair of NAFA’s newly renamed Law Enforce­ment Group, he knows the speci­ficity inher­ent in this unique fleet seg­ment. “Many com­mu­ni­ties rely on police vehi­cles and sup­port vehi­cles, K-9 unit vehi­cles, light tow­ers, and the list goes on…especially when dis­as­ters hap­pen, both nat­ural and man-made.”

READ MORE about this spe­cial group

NAFA IFA 2014 logo NAFA’s 2014 International Fleet Academy Touts Hard-Hitting Global Fleet Education

NAFA’s 2014 Inter­na­tional Fleet Acad­emy is the pre­mier global fleet con­fer­ence for a good rea­son. Fleet pro­fes­sion­als who attend the IFA learn from the best and most knowl­edge­able indi­vid­u­als on the sub­ject of global fleet man­age­ment. Atten­dees can share infor­ma­tion with col­leagues in an inti­mate set­ting arranged by NAFA, the most trusted name in fleet.

From dis­cus­sions regard­ing cloud-based loca­tion intel­li­gence soft­ware plat­forms, to fleet cen­tral­iza­tion ver­sus region­al­ized struc­ture, stan­dard­iza­tion of goods and ser­vices, staffing, how to iden­tify and visit the right regional peo­ple, and more, IFA pro­vides unpar­al­leled edu­ca­tion for fleet pro­fes­sion­als with inter­na­tional oversight.

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Fleet Marketing  
Ed Pierce, It'sTheArts

Before leav­ing last month’s topic of “earned” media (mar­ket­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tions your com­pany pays to deliver in media that reach your prospects and cus­tomers), here are a few con­sid­er­a­tions that I promised to address in greater detail: First, let’s talk about form and style of pro­mo­tional mes­sages by spe­cific media tac­tics beyond adver­tis­ing, which I spoke about last month.

Ed Pierce, It’s The Arts Marketing

As I did last month, I am bor­row­ing con­cepts from some of our industry’s best sales­peo­ple, but estab­lish­ing an effec­tive rela­tion­ship with a prospect or cus­tomer — espe­cially in a B2B mar­ket — is adap­tive. A great sales­per­son can shift eas­ily from one type of sales approach to another based on the envi­ron­ment (exhibit floor, customer’s office, home office visit) and on-the-spot cus­tomer feedback.

Like­wise, effec­tive mar­ket­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tions must adapt to the sit­u­a­tion. Last month, I noted that an effec­tive ad pro­vides a snap­shot of prod­uct value in terms that are impor­tant to the fleet man­ager. But an ad can only promise value, it can­not pro­vide enough sub­stan­ti­a­tion to close a sale (again, in B2B mar­kets). Direct mar­ket­ing and trade shows also con­strain the message.

Answer the Ques­tions that Fleet Man­agers Want to Know

READ MORE to find out how you can more effec­tively mar­ket your prod­uct or service

 
Fleet Technology  

Amer­i­cans haven’t nec­es­sar­ily fallen out of love with the auto­mo­bile. They just don’t enjoy the art of dri­ving as much any­more, and a grow­ing num­ber of Amer­i­cans seem ready to hand over com­mand to autonomous vehicles.

“Peo­ple are aware that they already drive cars con­trolled partly by com­put­ers,” said Insurance.com Man­ag­ing Edi­tor Des Toups. “Now they see fea­tures like col­li­sion avoid­ance on new mod­els and hear about Google cars hit­ting the roads in a cou­ple of years. An autonomous car is not sci­ence fic­tion anymore.”

A new study finds that fully three-quarters of licensed U.S. motorists would be very likely to con­sider, if not buy, self-driving vehi­cles. And if offered lower insur­ance rates, the fig­ure jumps to a whop­ping 86%, found web­site Insurance.com.

READ MORE about the findings.

 
Fleet Accident Management  
Bob Glose, Director of Operations, CEI

The CEI Group Inc. (CEI) saved client fleets $6.96 mil­lion on sedan and truck acci­dent repairs over the first six months of 2014, the com­pany announced.

The sav­ings came from a com­bi­na­tion of reduced labor time, lower expen­di­tures for parts and paint, and less time to get repairs com­pleted, which saved time on tem­po­rary replace­ment rental expenses, accord­ing to Bob Glose, CEI’s direc­tor of oper­a­tions.

“The sav­ings con­tinue to prove the value of hav­ing expert phys­i­cal dam­age apprais­ers on staff, and CEI’s effec­tive­ness in expe­dit­ing repairs at our net­work shops,” said Mr. Glose.

READ MORE




Fleet Trends & Issues


Fleet Logistics AppFleet Logistics Launches New Driver App

Fleet Logis­tics, Europe’s largest inde­pen­dent fleet man­age­ment provider, is launch­ing a free dri­ver app to pro­vide fleet dri­vers with access to all their vehi­cle details, mileage data, sup­port ser­vices and other key information.

The ‘Fleet Logis­tics Mobil­ity Con­trol App’ is now avail­able for all users of Win­dows smart phones on Fleet Logis­tics’ fleet of around 130,000 vehi­cles across Europe. They are soon to be joined by users of all Android and Apple smart phones.

READ MORE

2015-Ford-F-150-pipes-300x195Ford’s New F-150 Pickup Drops Weight – But Raises Price

Ford has more than enough rid­ing on the new F-150 to test its pay­load capac­ity. The truck has spent three decades at the top of the auto­mo­tive sales charts, lead­ing as both the top truck and the best-selling pas­sen­ger vehi­cle overall.

By migrat­ing from a tra­di­tional steel body to one made almost entirely of light­weight alu­minum, the 2015 Ford F-150 can be seen as a bar­gain because of the antic­i­pated fuel sav­ings that will come with shav­ing as much as 732 pounds off the big truck’s mass.

The new truck’s sticker price jumps by as much as $3,615, depend­ing on the spe­cific model. Ford defends the increase by not­ing it is adding sig­nif­i­cantly more con­tent to the 2015 remake of America’s best-selling vehicle.

READ MORE to learn about the changes

crash testIIHS Crash Testing Of Small Cars Reveals New “Top Safety Pick” Models

The Insur­ance Insti­tute for High­way Safety (IIHS) has com­pleted its lat­est round of crash tests, exam­in­ing 12 small vehi­cles that typ­i­cally sell in low vol­umes. Only one of the tested mod­els earned the high­est rat­ing of “Top Safety Pick+” due to its crash-test per­for­mance and avail­able collision-warning sys­tem, while five addi­tional mod­els received a “Top Safety Pick” rat­ing. The remain­ing six small cars did not qual­ify for rec­om­men­da­tion by the IIHS.

Accord­ing to the IIHS, the 2014 Chevro­let Volt receives a “Top Safety Pick+” rat­ing. It joins the2014 Honda Civic Sedan, 2014 Mazda 3, 2014 Toy­ota Prius, 2015 Volk­swa­gen Golf 4-door, and2015 Volk­swa­gen Golf GTI 4-door as the only small cars to receive this rating.

READ MORE to find out about other “Top Safety Pick” vehicles

tesla_model_s22Edmunds Raises Tesla Reliability Questions

Busi­ness Week, July 31, 2014

As Tesla pre­pared to swing by Wall Street for a finan­cial update Thurs­day evening, the upstart automaker was badly dented on Edmunds.com. The California-based car critic just sold its Tesla sedan and pub­lished a lengthy list of main­te­nance issues it encoun­tered in its 17 months of ownership.

READ the litany of com­plaints, accord­ing to Edmunds

Fleet Telematics  

For the EMS indus­try, get­ting to the emer­gency loca­tion as quickly as pos­si­ble is always the top pri­or­ity. When every sec­ond counts, you need the abil­ity to send the clos­est vehi­cle on the most effi­cient route pos­si­ble, while still ensur­ing dri­vers are being safe in the process. GPS track­ing solu­tions, like GPS Insight, make sure that you have the best infor­ma­tion pos­si­ble to respond in a crit­i­cal situation.

READ MORE

 
Fleet Management  

What does it mean when PHH Arval talks about solu­tions that drive your busi­ness forward?

Within PHH Arval, the “dri­ving your busi­ness for­ward” is about the cus­tomer. That is what we’re focused on. When I think of the indus­try and what is most impor­tant, it is two things. One is data and infor­ma­tion and how you aggre­gate that data to cap­ture it for the cus­tomer and what you do with it. Two is our strate­gic con­sult­ing, which is tak­ing all of the infor­ma­tion and mak­ing sug­ges­tive rec­om­men­da­tions on how to move for­ward. The cus­tomer can fully out­source to us and we will assist them in dri­ving their busi­ness forward.

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Fleet Safety  

As part of a mutual com­mit­ment to com­mer­cial fleet safety, Fleet­mat­ics Group PLC  and Fleet Safety Insti­tute recently announced the avail­abil­ity of a co-authored white paper. The announce­ment comes in con­junc­tion with the Fleet Safety Con­fer­ence that took place from July 22–23 in Schaum­burg, IL.

The paper enti­tled, “Ensur­ing Fleet and Dri­ver Safety: How Tech­nol­ogy Helps Ser­vice Busi­nesses Adhere to Reg­u­la­tions and Pro­tect Employ­ees,” is designed to help edu­cate com­mer­cial fleet-related busi­nesses about com­mon safety-related issues and how to use tech­nol­ogy to address them.

READ MORE, and DOWNLOAD THE WHITEPAPER





Fleet Management Resources 
AmeriFleet
Offering a nationwide vehicle delivery and relocation service; serving the corporate and commercial fleet industry.
LeasePlan
LeasePlan is the world's leading high-touch service provider for vehicle leasing and fleet management.
PHH
Customizing global fleet management to achieve your goals.
ARI
Driven fleet professionals. Driving results.
NAFA
NAFA is the association for the diverse vehicle fleet management profession regardless of organizational type, geographic location, or fleet composition.
The CEI Group Inc.
North America's largest accident management and fleet driver safety company.
GPS Insight
GPS Insight offers GPS tracking solutions to meet your organization's unique requirements and challenges.
PARS
PARS' mission is to provide you with high-quality service at competitive prices for all of your transportation needs.