Southern News Group CEO Wea Lee (center) strikes a pose with Chen Tiemei (right), public affairs director, and Cecilia Yang, news editor of Chinese TV dating show If You Are the One , on Wednesday in Houston. May Zhou / China Daily

What could be better than finding love and becoming famous all at the same time?

If You Are the One, the wildly popular Chinese TV dating show, is coming to Houston, announced Wea Lee, CEO of Southern News Group (SNG), on Wednesday night in Houston. SNG is a partner of China Jiangsu TV (JSTV), creator of the show.

"We want to use this opportunity to provide a service to young people in the region and promote exchanges between the US and China," said Lee.

Registration and application details can be found at SNG’s newly established website, CheerInUS.com. The new website, piloted in Dallas, aims to develop into a multi-functional portal for Chinese news, education and investment in major cities in the US, as well as provide a platform for exchanges between the US and China, said Lee.

By organizing If You Are the One auditions through this website, Lee hopes to generate more traffic for the site, which already attracts tens of thousands visitors daily.

According to Chen Tiemei, public affairs director of SNG, applications to be selected as a contestant on the show are being accepted now, the limit is 700 and the deadline is Oct 4.

Any single adult who lives in the US and speaks Mandarin is eligible to register, which is free. "If you want to find love and become famous at the same time, this would be a perfect opportunity for you," said Chen.

In the first round of screening, 100 applicants will be selected from the pool and go through face to face interviews at sites in Houston, San Antonio and Dallas. About ten applicants will be selected as guests to appear on the show in China.

A production team from JSTV will come to Houston and shoot three-minute video clips of each of the selected guests. JSTV will pay all the lodging, meals and half of the round trip air ticket for each confirmed guest to fly to Nanjing, Jiangsu province to video tape the studio portion of the show in November. The final production — a special Southern US edition of If You Are the One — is scheduled to be aired in December.

According to Chen, this is just the beginning of auditions for If You Are the One. "We will organize events for interested applicants and provide an opportunity for them to find love even if they did not make it to the show," she said.

Since its inception in 2010, JSTV’s If You Are the One has attracted millions of applicants. Thousands have appeared on the reality show and some lucky ones have even found love through it.

The show is already global, with editions produced for the US, Canada, Great Britain, Italy, France, Germany, South Korea and Australia. It has become popular with overseas Chinese as well.

Meng Fei, the much celebrated host of If You Are the One, will come to Houston in early October to meet with the selected guests and fans to help promote the show.

This is the second hit TV show from the Chinese mainland that SNG has partnered on. Earlier this year, SNG worked with CCTV and hosted auditions for CCTV Chinese New Year Gala 2014 US Talent Hunt in the Southern US region. SNG selected 15 acts from Houston, Dallas and Washington to participate in the final competition in Los Angeles this coming weekend, Lee said.

mayzhou@chinadailyusa.com