Marketplace

Overview

Orbit Marketplace is a powerful platform feature that enables both automated and manual distribution of Tours to Carriers, matching the right Carrier at the right price. It serves as a central hub for managing transport opportunities through competitive auctions and fixed-price instant offers, providing operators with flexible tools to efficiently match Carriers with Tours.

Key Highlights

Dual Distribution Methods: Choose between competitive auctions or fixed-price instant offers
Automated Sequences: Create sophisticated distribution workflows combining Carrier selection, scoring, and offer management
Real-time Notifications: Keep all participants informed through multiple communication channels
Fine-grained Access Control: Manage marketplace operations through detailed permission settings

Key Concepts and Features

Distribution Methods

Auctions

Auctions enable competitive bidding among carriers for transport opportunities. Orbit Marketplace supports two auction types:

Visible Auctions
- Can have an optional initial price
- Initial price can be set manually, or use the price set on the tour
- The current lowest (winning) bid is visible to all participating carriers
- Carriers can only place bids lower than the initial price or current lowest bid
- Promotes competitive pricing through transparency
Secret Auctions
- Can have an optional suggested price which is displayed to the Carrier and acts as a non-binding recommendation
- Bids can be placed above or below the suggested price
- Carriers bid without seeing other participants' bids
- Creates a more strategic bidding environment

Auction Configuration Options

Initial price (for visible auctions)
Suggested price (for secret auctions)
Optional end date and time
Auction visibility type (secret/visible)

Instant Offers

Instant offers provide a direct, fixed-price proposition to specific carriers:

Set optional expiration dates
Configure fixed pricing (manually or using the price set on the Tour)
Receive immediate Carrier responses

Sequences

Sequences automate the entire matching process between Tours and Carriers in Orbit Marketplace. When set up carefully and tailored to specific cases, Sequences enable you to fully automate large parts of your Carrier-side operations. Every Sequence consists of three SequenceBricks. Each SequenceBrick can be managed individually and used in more than one Sequence, enabling you to re-use logic and procedures.

There are three types of SequenceBricks: Select, Score and Distribute. In a Sequence, they are executed in this order. First, a given number of Carriers are selected. Next, they are individually assigned a score. Finally, in the Distribution SequenceBrick, previously selected and scored Carriers are sent individual offers or are invited to competitive auctions using a user-defined workflow — a combination of action and wait steps.

Select SequenceBricks

The Select SequenceBrick allows Operators to create rules for choosing which Carriers will be processed by the sequence. You can apply multiple selection rules in combination. Select Rules considers all carriers present in the system at the time of execution.

Carriers can be filtered based on the following criteria:
- Carrier
  - Carrier Creation date
  - Carrier Name
  - Carrier Contact name
  - Carrier E-mail
  - Carrier Phone
  - Carrier Country
  - Carrier City
  - Carrier Postal Code
  - Carrier Region
  - Carrier Properties
- Carrier’s Vehicles
  - has at least one vehicle that satisfies vehicle extras of tour (boolean)
  - has at least one vehicle that has property (property value)
  - has at least one vehicle with height (number, comp value: max load height of tour)
  - has at least one vehicle with payload capacity (number, comp value: sum of load weights of tour)
  - has at least one vehicle with total weight (number, new comp value: sum of load weights of tour)
  - has at least one vehicle that can fit loads (boolean)
  - has at least one vehicle that has loadplan weight utilization below (percentage number, gets min util value of all vehicles)
  - has at least one vehicle that has loadplan volume utilization below (percentage number, gets min util value of all vehicles)
  - has at least one vehicle that has loadplan ldm utilization below (percentage number, gets min util value of all vehicles)
Carrier’s Users
- has at least one user that satisfies carrier user extras of tour (boolean)
The above filters can be set relative to either fixed values or dynamically using characteristics of the Tour in question like:
- Number of stops
- Maximum weight
- Tour price
- Vehicle class requirements
- Start date and time
- Region

Score SequenceBricks

The Score Brick makes use of the same rules accessible by the Select SequenceBrick, but extends them with the option to either add or subtract a score to the carrier. This will help us to choose the carriers for a given step of the Distribute Brick according to their scoring.

Distribute SequenceBricks

In the Distribute Brick you have the option to either add add Wait Step, or an Action .

The Wait Step simply allows you to set a certain time the sequence should wait, this can be useful before or in between multiple Action steps. The wait time can be set with either:

absolute (a set number of seconds/minutes/hours/days)
relative (a percentage to calculate the duration relative to the time until the tour starts. You can also specify minimum and maximum durations to limit the range

The Action consists of two parts, the carrier selection and the actual action to be executed.

The Carrier selection uses the previously created scored list of carriers and can be done in one of three ways:

absolute (setting a range of absolute values, for example 1. (highest scored) - 10. of the scored carriers list)

percentage (setting a range in percent, for example the top 10% of the list)

points (setting a range in points, for example between 500 and 1000 points)

The setup for the execution of the action follows a similar pattern as the configuration of the Auction or Instant Offer in the Marketplace itself, here we set:

Instant Offer or Auction
Visible or Secret Auction
Price (initial price or suggested price)
an optional auction end
- similar to the Wait Step described above, we can set absolute values, or values relative to the start of the tour, this will be evaluated when the sequence is executed.

These settings allow for flexible design of the Distribute Brick of your sequence to:

Define distribution patterns and timing
Configure waiting periods between distribution phases
Set carrier group sizes for offers

Sequence Pattern Example:


1. Select top-scored (for example top 10%) carriers
2. Create auction for selected group
3. Wait for specified duration
4. If no acceptance, create instant offers at adjusted price
5. Distribute to remaining eligible carriers

Notifications

The Marketplace implements a comprehensive notification system:

Channels:
- Email notifications
- Mobile push (In-app) notifications
- Browser push notifications
Notification Types:
- New Offer
- Undercut (auction updates)
- Lost (auction/offer status)
- Won (successful bid)
- Tour Assigned

Carriers can customize their notification preferences for each type of communication channel.

Permissions and Access Control

Access to Marketplace features is managed through a granular permission system:

Sequence Management
- Creation and modification of SequenceBricks
- Configuration of complete Sequences
Distribution Control
- Authority to start auctions
- Permission to send instant offers
- Ability to modify active distributions
Monitoring and Oversight
- View auction progress
- Track carrier responses

Permissions are assigned through roles, which can be customized by operator administrators.

Walkthrough: Creating and Managing Distributions

Setting Up a Basic Auction

Navigate to the Marketplace section in Orbit MissionControl
Select the tour
Select the carriers in the carrier table
Configure auction settings:
- Choose auction type (visible/secret)
- Set initial or suggested price
- Set optional end time
Launch the auction

Alternatively use the Quick Action Button to start an Auction with the tour price set as initial price.

Creating an Automated Sequence

Create Select Brick for carrier filtering:
- Choose carrier criteria (e.g., region, postal code, properties)
- Set up tour-specific requirements (vehicle class, weight limits)
- Define comparison operators for each criterion
Configure Score Brick for carrier ranking:
- Set up scoring rules using the filter options also available in the Select Brick
- Assign positive or negative points based on carrier attributes
- Define scoring weights for different criteria
Set up Distribute Brick:
- Configure carrier selection method (absolute/percentage/points)
- Add Wait Steps with appropriate timing (absolute or relative to tour start)
- Set up Actions (auctions or instant offers) with pricing and duration
Combine bricks into sequence:
- Choose one of each Brick type to create a sequence
You can select your sequence in the Marketplace
Test and deploy:
- Run test sequence with limited carrier group
- Verify notifications and distribution flow
- Activate for production use

Industry Examples

Example 1: Quick-Service Food Delivery (Pronto Pizza)

Pronto Pizza, a chain with 25 locations across Madrid, uses Orbit Marketplace to manage their delivery operations efficiently during peak hours.

Scenario: During weekends, Pronto Pizza experiences high order volumes across all locations. They need to quickly dispatch drivers for time-sensitive deliveries while maintaining cost efficiency.

Marketplace Implementation:

Sequence Setup:
- Select Brick:
  - Carrier City: Madrid (where restaurant locations are)
  - Carrier Postal Code: Specific codes matching restaurant delivery zones
  - Carrier Properties: Has "Food Delivery" and "Thermal Bag" properties
- Score Brick:
  - +100 points for carriers with "Premium Thermal Equipment" property
  - +200 points for carriers with "High Rating" property
  - +150 points for carriers with "Consistent Delivery" property
  - -50 points for carriers with "Recent Delay" property
Distribution Workflow:
- When a new batch of pizza orders is ready, the system creates an instant offer for the top 10% scored carriers
- Offers expire after 120 seconds
- If no acceptance, the system creates a visible auction for the next 30% of carriers
- Auction runs for 180 seconds with the initial rate visible

Results:

94% of deliveries are assigned within 3 minutes
Customer satisfaction increased due to faster delivery times
Delivery costs decreased by 12% through competitive bidding during non-peak hours

Example 2: International Freight Transport (Orion Logistics)

Orion Logistics, based in Singapore, manages container shipments between major ports in Asia and Europe. They use Orbit Marketplace to coordinate with trucking providers for final-mile deliveries.

Scenario: When cargo vessels arrive at the Port of Rotterdam, Orion needs to arrange transportation to distribution centers across Western Europe, with varying urgency and price sensitivity.

Marketplace Implementation:

Tiered Distribution Strategy:
- High-Priority Shipments: Instant offers to premium carriers with temperature-controlled vehicles
- Standard Shipments: Secret auctions to qualified carriers
- Bulk Shipments: Visible auctions to maximize cost efficiency
Automated Sequence for Standard Container Delivery:
- Select Brick: Filters for carriers with:
  - Appropriate vehicle class for container transport
  - Valid certifications for cross-border transport
  - Operations in destination country using Orbit’s Region feature
- Score Brick:
  - +300 points for carriers with previous on-time delivery record
  - +200 points for carriers with specific equipment (container locks, tracking)
  - +100 points for carriers with multilingual drivers
  - Weighted scoring based on distance from port (closer carriers score higher)
- Distribute Brick:
  - First action: Instant offers to top 5% of carriers with 2-hour expiration
  - Wait step: 2 hours
  - Second action: Secret auction to next 15% of carriers with 8-hour duration
  - Third action: Visible auction to all remaining qualified carriers

Results:

78% reduction in dock waiting time
Improved carrier relationships through fair opportunity distribution
15% cost savings on non-urgent shipments through competitive bidding
Enhanced visibility of transport options for operations team

Restrictions

Sequences currently allow a maximum of 2000 selected Carriers

FAQs and Troubleshooting

Q: What happens if an auction receives no bids? A: The auction can be manually ended by the operator, or it will automatically end at its configured end time if one was set. The tour can then be redistributed through a new auction, instant offer or direct assign to carrier.

Q: Can I modify an active auction? A: Active auctions cannot be modified, but they can be ended manually if needed and a new distribution can be started.

Q: How do carriers get notified of new opportunities? A: Carriers receive notifications through their configured channels (email, push, in-app). They can manage their notification preferences in their account settings.

Q: What happens if multiple carriers accept an instant offer simultaneously? A: The system processes acceptances in order of receipt. Once an offer is accepted, it is automatically withdrawn from other carriers.

Q: Can I combine different distribution methods? A: Yes, through sequences you can create sophisticated distribution strategies combining both auctions and instant offers with conditional logic and timing rules.