P I N G A N B R I N G S M O D E R N F I N A N C E TO C H I N A 199 strategic pact with SOHU.com (a leading Chinese search engine company) in 2001 allowed Ping An to leverage SOHU.com's user base of 12.5 million and more than 90 million daily page views, an enormous branding opportunity reaching a highly targetable pop- ulation of well-educated middle-class urban youths. Later the same year, Ping An built its first national 24-hour cus- tomer service call center in Suzhou, a first for China's insurance industry. The initial purpose of Ping An's telephone hotline (which could be reached by dialing 95511) was to provide basic customer services, answering inquiries, processing orders, and handling com- plaints. In line with its proactive, customer-centric sales goal, Ping An wanted to improve the scope and quality of its services in order to generate profit through telemarketing and outbound telesales. The effect was to turn the customer call service center from a cost center into a profit center.