Virtuoso Introduces Enhanced Member Benefits

It’s Virtuoso Travel Week and the international luxury travel agency network has kicked off the event by introducing several company updates and a number of new member benefits.

Included:

• The network now includes 391 travel agency members with 743 offices throughout 40 countries, and 11,400 travel advisors.
• Virtuoso has received 191 advisor inquiries for affiliation – an 11% increase – which in turn were shared with agency members who were looking to add more advisors to their rosters.
• Virtuoso introduced this year a robust meeting and events schedule that reached more member agencies and front line advisors,
• Virtuoso Travel Week saw a 9.3% increase in total member attendance and an 11.7% increase in attendance by front line advisors.
• Virtuoso Forum, which focused on agency owners and managers, was the highest rated event of 2016, with 99.3% attendees saying it met their business goals.
• Virtuoso announced it will be rolling out ABC Auxiliary Hotel Rates, offering exclusive enhanced commissions on more than 40,000 non-preferred hotels as of this November.
• Virtuoso Cruise Alerts, a new feature that tracks price changes on cruises and sends email notifications, will be rolled out to US and Canadian members during the fourth quarter of this year.
• Virtuoso has seen a significant bump in its web traffic, reporting 100,000 unique visitors per month. Virtuoso says the leads generated by the site boast an average first sale of US$8,000 and have a 20% conversion rate. The network’s exclusive Reviews & Recommendations program continues to be a key differentiator in satisfying information needs for the buying public.
• Virtuoso is now offering personalized versions of Virtuoso.com to its advisors on a complimentary basis.
• Virtuoso announced it has established the framework to create communities of like-minded advisors and preferred suppliers within its larger network. The concept originated with the group’s Virtuoso Voyages cruise program and VAST, its active and specialty community. This week it launched Virtuoso Wellness, the third in its lineup of niche communities.
• Virtuoso Incubator has led to exclusive partnerships for cruise availability and booking: Passport Online and Tandem. These will be available to advisors by end of year.
• Virtuoso announced its new hotel booking tool for consumers, giving them the ability to shop the network’s robust selection of more than 1,100 hotels in over 100 countries at a time most convenient to them. Customers merely select, purchase and confirm. The booking is then turned over to the advisor of record or assigned to one for handling. While technology enabled, the advisor is always part of the overall process.

Virtuoso Travel Week continues through Aug. 11 with a record-breaking 5,257 travel professionals from 98 countries on hand at Bellagio Resort & Casino, ARIA Resort & Casino and Vdara Hotel & Spa in Las Vegas.