16 Shipping KPIs to Consider [2024 Updated]

There’s a lot to shipping and getting it right for client satisfaction and company profitability. One way to ensure success is to monitor key performance indicators for the shipping industry. A key performance indicator (KPI) is a measure used to track and understand the shipment process and supply chain metrics. When measuring success with a KPI, a logistics leader monitors supply chain, warehouse, and transportation data to see how well the internal processes are working.

With continued digitization in the shipping sector, the plethora of data is analyzed to show whether the company’s goals are being met and any improvement trends and challenges. Changes in a logistics key performance indicator over time can highlight an area needing attention, a problem to address. Perhaps delivery slowed down or the order fulfillment process is dropping. The KPIs allow the shipping managers to develop improvements within the customer order cycle.

We share 16 KPIs in three categories to consider using in your shipping company.

What does KPI mean in logistics?

KPIs are used in all industries to measure results and performance over time. There’s no end to the number and type of KPIs used to measure performance metrics in the logistics industry. In logistics, KPIs can help a warehouse manager understand performance at a glance. It helps the manager know whether customers will be satisfied based on the metrics.

KPIs are important in logistics to ensure customer satisfaction, whether retaining customers or attracting new ones. Customers expect fast and accurate delivery, and they expect their goods to arrive undamaged. This puts a big burden on the shipper to meet these demands. Customers are looking at KPIs too, but not listed as such. They want to know how long it takes for their goods to arrive and know that they’re well-packaged and accurate. Competitors can take away this business if a shipper’s logistics KPI metrics aren’t met.

What are the types of shipping performance indicators?

In logistics as a whole, there are three (3) main types of KPI categories.

1. Procurement

Procurement KPIs track processes and costs like the inventory cost, material arrival time, and reorder time. It can also be considered a supply chain KPI. These KPIs are helpful for managing and tracking inventory turnover in the warehouse and ensuring the right products and materials are available at the right time, without overspending. The freight forwarder may also be tracking procurement KPIs, as the goods are shipped to the warehouse, from origin to final destination, for their customers.

2. Logistics

Logistics or warehouse KPIs track the picking and packing process, as well as order accuracy and picks per worker. Logistics managers place great importance in these shipping KPIs. Proper logistics metric evaluations are vital in assessing the warehouse performance.  The metrics are important for 3PLs contracting with shipping companies, as well as for warehouse managers running their own operations.

3. Transportion

Transportation KPIs include the freight pick-ups and delivery times, freight cost, as well as cost from total order placement to delivery. Carrier performance, delivery process and distribution metrics are important to measure with KPIs. A distribution KPI helps in delivery operation efficiency for the logistics company staff to understand how quickly and cost-effectively customers are receiving their products.

What are 16 Examples of Good KPIs in the Shipping Industry?

Each shipper, seller, warehouse manager, and logistics manager will want to use KPIs specific to their own needs. For this reason, there is not one KPI that everyone in the shipping industry will want to use. Each shipping company should pick the ones they want to track and potentially improve. Additional KPIs can be added as needed, whether for the short term or the long term. Here are 16 to consider.

Procurement KPI Examples

1. Inventory velocity: The inventory velocity KPI represents the speed at which each inventory type cycles during a specific time period. In accounting, this might be represented as the cost of goods sold divided by the average amount of that inventory on hand.
2. Inventory turnover: Similar to inventory velocity, inventory turnover measures how many times the entire inventory is purchased in a given time period. This represents efficient production planning plus sales and marketing management. When it comes to inventory management, higher turnover levels are preferable. Of course, the rate depends on the industry and the types of products sold. A company selling large expensive pieces of equipment will likely have a lower inventory turnover rate than low-cost apparel.
3. Inventory-to-sales ratio: This KPI identifies overstocks and considers what inventory is available for sale compared to the number or quantity actually sold.
4. Customer backorder rate: This KPI tracks the number of orders that cannot be fulfilled at the time a customer places them. High backorder rates may indicate problems with inventory management or supply chain efficiency.

Logistics KPI Examples

5. Picking accuracy: Picking accuracy, also called order accuracy, is a KPI example of the number of orders picked accurately, without errors. The number is compared to the total number of orders and can be calculated by items returned from a customer order, or from quality assurance checks when the order is sealed and labeled for shipping. Order accuracy is important for customer service as well as operational performance. Perfect order rate is another way to look at it.
6. Pick and pack costs: This KPI measures the cost of picking and packing the items for delivery. It includes labor costs as well as packing methods and supplies.
7. Lead time : This KPI measures order fulfillment performance, the time from the order’s receipt to the day it’s delivered. A longer lead time means something went wrong during the process, whether the orders aren’t shared quickly enough with the distribution center, the current inventory levels aren’t adequate, inventory accuracy is problematic, shipping capacity is limited, or there’s a backup in the picking and packing process.
8. Number of shipments: This KPI measures how many shipments are processed and shipped each day, week or month. The metric helps identify shipping trends based on holiday or season, allowing your company to plan labor and transportation needs more accurately.

Transportation KPIs  Examples

9. Warehousing cost: This warehousing KPI reflects the cost to move products in and out of your warehouse. Some shipping KPI examples that  fall under this section include truckload utilization, cost of carrying inventory or warehouse space utilization.
10. Shipping cost: Shipping can be a major cost center in logistics. Fortunately, there are ways to lower costs like with contract optimization and invoice audit recovery. But it’s hard to know what to lower without having some logistics metrics like shipping cost.
11. Transit time: In the days of one or two-day Amazon delivery, your time in transit, or delivery time, matters. The delivery time is measured from when the  transportation carrier picks up the package to when it’s delivered. Customers may get alerts that the order is ready, so they can track its movement and timing.
12. On-time pick-up and delivery: This metric is similar to delivery time, but hones in on the on-time portion for both pick-up and delivery. Often times you’ll hear the term “DIFOT” which stands for Delivery In Full, On-Time, and this can we used as a success metric.
13. Transportation cost: The transportation cost KPI considers all transportation costs spanning order placement through the delivery. Transportation costs include the number of shipments, accessorial surcharges, fuel and the freight bills among many others.
14. Cost Per Delivery: This KPI calculates the average cost for each delivery made. It can help identify inefficiencies in the delivery process and potential areas for cost reduction.
15. Carrier compliance: Your transportation carriers represent your company, even if your name isn’t on their truck. That’s why it’s important to monitor carrier compliance. Compliance can include factors like unsafe driving, hours of service, vehicle maintenance, driver fitness, hazardous materials compliance, and others. By enforcing carrier compliance KPIs, you’re able to have some control over carrier performance.
16. First-Time Delivery Rate: This KPI measures the percentage of deliveries made successfully on the first attempt. Higher rates indicate effective routing and scheduling, leading to improved customer satisfaction and lower delivery costs.

Making use of your logistics KPIs

There are many lessons to learn from logistics and supply chain management KPIs, and using key performance indicators in the shipping industry can lead to better performance and profits. There are a few ways to lower shipping costs and improve shipping KPIs without much effort. One way is by using an invoice audit recovery program. Shipware’s program usually saves clients 1% to 9% of their total invoices. The program can be used for parcel, LTL, or FTL shipping. Invoice audit recovery software catches invoicing errors, ranging from a missed service guarantee to an incorrect accessorial fee. The software works automatically to find the errors and apply for credit on behalf of the shipper. Refunds are deposited directly into the shipper’s account and involve no shipper effort. Shipware’s software is automated, running in the background, and is easy to set up. There are no out-of-pocket costs. The fees are paid only if money is recovered from carrier errors. The invoice audit recovery software improves the shipper’s bottom line, and can also improve several key performance indicators for the shipping industry, helping supply chain management as a whole.

Another service that can benefit logistics key performance is optimizing carrier contracts. It’s important to evaluate and renegotiate carrier choices on a regular basis. That includes more than just what carriers are used. It means looking into the shipping details and nuances, such as comparing your metrics to benchmarked data. Shipware provides contract optimization services for parcel, LTL, and FTL freight carriers. Shipware uses proprietary benchmarking data to dig into the shipper’s data in a way that is hard for shippers to do themselves. That’s because Shipware’s experts have decades of experience behind the scenes on the carrier side. That expertise allows Shipware to better understand what terms can be negotiated, and by how much. There is more to negotiating a carrier contract than just requesting a higher discount, and Shipware can help lower your annual costs by up to 30%, which positively impacts shipping KPIs.

Shippers need all the tools available in their arsenal to improve their logistics KPIs, and Shipware would like to help. To learn more about how invoice audit recovery services and optimizing your contracts can help your company’s supply chain metrics, please contact us today!

No Contract. No Credit Card. No Set-up Fee. No Hassle.