The retainer comes as a result of a three-way pitch involving Mindshare, Maxus and OMD. The pitch took place in early April and OMD was announced the winner last week. The account is estimated to be worth US$90 million (RMB 570 million) in monitored adspend.
In their third year of media partnership, ZhenAi has now extended OMD's services beyond media planning and buying to cover advanced analytics, branded content, dashboard creation and maintenance.
Bhasker Jaiswal, managing partner of OMD's Business Intelligence specialist unit, said his team will work with the planning team to provide return-on-investment modeling based on the client's business needs. For instance, a tailor-made dashboard will enable continuous monitoring and real-time optimisation of ZhenAi.com's communications.
As of March, the Shenzhen-based online matchmaker has 40 million registered members who use its internet and telephone matchmaking services to seek romantic relationships. It primarily targets the 25-to-45 age group.
Siew Ping Lim, CEO of OMD China, added, "Given ZhenAi's business model, it is critical for us to have in-depth understanding of what are their key performance indicators, and how to drive business outcomes rather than just being a provider of media deliverables."