Travelport, the business services provider to the global travel industry, today announces a number of key successes concerning its professional networking site for travel agents - www.travelportopinions.com.  The tool, which connects members of the global travel industry and harnesses their collective travel knowledge, saw a total of 7,300 members and over 9,000 questions and answers by the end of 2010, representing a user increase of 200%. 

Countries with a notable rise in users and activity included the UK, France, Belgium, Switzerland, the UAE, South Africa and Australia.  Statistically every hour saw at least two new registrations, one review added and 15 messages shared around the world while users spent on average 15% longer on the site.

Last year, 75 new features and enhancements were added including a ‘people you may know’ application, ‘latest activities of your contacts’, an improved email alert system and an enhanced forum layout. The latest feature to kick-off 2011 has been the introduction of ’groups’ – a means to carve niche communities based on shared interests and location within the site.

Jérôme Moisan, Travelport general manager for the UK, Ireland and France, remarked: “Travelport Opinions has proved a massive success this past year with a record number of new trade partners joining us.  We were recently recognised as Travel Pioneer of The Year at the 2010 Travolution Awards in London and with new applications and tools being added to the site in 2011, we anticipate that more agents will show keenness to join and we see opportunities for the trade community to support each other at a richer level.”

Members of the travel agency community globally including business and leisure agencies, TMCs, tour operators and consolidators, can join for free: www.travelportopinions.com/pr.