Tech-driven media, CX and creative agency, Affinity, made its presence known at the 2015 Australian agency awards. It was a finalist in the AdNews Agency of the Year Awards in both CX Agency and Best Use of Data. It won bronze in Campaign Asia’s Independent Agency of the Year and Digital Agency of the Year. And it was a finalist for B&T’s DM Agency of the Year.

It also won a handful of significant pieces of new business, which meant it added six new staff.

New clients are Flordis, won in a three-way pitch, and the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children (RIDBC).

Affinity will manage strategy, creative, data and media duties for Flordis, a brand of clinically proven natural medicines. The RIDBC has engaged the agency to conduct a comprehensive brand review and before developing creative and media.

After winning the Media Federation of Australia award for Best Use of Data and taking out the Mumbrella MSix Clever Use of Data title in 2015 for its work on Narellan Pools, Australia’s largest pool builder has expanded Affinity’s role to include strategy, creative, CRM, SEO and media.

Affinity has therefore added new people in creative, media and business management.

L-r: Martin Greguric, Nicholas Brown, Renee Stekel

Creative team, Martin Greguric and Nicholas Brown, were won from Grey Health by creative director, Marcus Tesoreiro, for their skills in branding, social media, healthcare, experiential and digital.

The pair won a 2014 New York Festivals’ Global Award as well as the 2014 Health Share Award Crowd Cup in Germany. Brown has worked in the UK’s hottest healthcare agencies, Saatchi & Saatchi Health, EuroRSCG Life and DDB Remedy, art directing for brands such as Pfizer, Canon, GSK and Mitsubishi. Greguric has worked at Arnold, Lavender* and The One Centre to SapientNitro, Droga5 and Razorfish in a career of more than a decade, with his major clients being McDonald’s, Volvo, Samsung and Qantas.

Renée Stekel joins Affinity as business director from Melbourne agency Milo & Co. She has steered brands like Bupa, Australia Post, Visa Europe, and Monash University in her career in Australia and the UK.

Dhwani Mathur and Peter Chui join the Affini team in account management and data science respectively.

Luke Brown, Affinity chief executive officer commented, “The past 12 months were outstanding at Affinity. We produced work that delivered real business results for our clients with the added bonus that much of what we did was critically recognised both locally and internationally.”