Internet Veteran's Fourth Venture: Yidianling Aims to Redefine Online Psychological Counseling
Proxima Capital
Investment Institutions in the Medical Technology Field
As we come to realize that the brain is nearly the most complex entity in the known universe, a hundred-billion-dollar market spanning from physical health to mental well-being awaits exploration.
Amid the mental health needs of 250 million people, VCBeat has recently launched a special series on the “Mental Health Industry.” Spanning enterprises to markets and domestic to overseas sectors, where challenges and opportunities coexist, we will conduct a comprehensive scan of this field. If you are involved in this industry, you are welcome to engage with the authors at any time; for media coverage inquiries, please contact VCBeat directly.
Xu Yingqi, a native of Zhejiang Province, is an undisputed “veteran” of the internet industry. In 2003, when the online gaming sector was just beginning to surge, Xu led a team to launch the game trading platform “5173.com.” Within just a few years, they grew the website into a billion-yuan enterprise, with annual revenues reaching RMB 700–800 million.
In 2010, Xu Yingqi embarked on his second entrepreneurial venture, entering the pharmaceutical distribution sector by founding a pharmaceutical website named “818,” which integrated more than 300 pharmacies across China onto an online platform. When Xu departed, “818” had achieved an annual transaction volume of RMB 380 million.
In 2013, Xu Yingqi embarked on his third entrepreneurial venture, recognizing the burgeoning potential of internet finance at the time, and founded the “658” Financial Network. By 2015, the platform had achieved a cumulative transaction volume of RMB 1.3 billion.
Yi Dian Ling Founder Xu Yingqi. Image provided by Yi Dian Ling
Over a decade of entrepreneurship, Xu Yingqi has consistently built internet platforms, always positioning himself at the forefront of emerging trends. Reflecting on his fourth venture, Xu admitted, “The internet is both a mindset and a tool, but it must be grounded in practical application. I am deeply committed to building a company that creates social value.” Thus, in 2015, the online psychological counseling platform Yi Dian Ling was launched. After three years of development, Yi Dian Ling now boasts 2 million registered users, 80,000 daily active users, and more than 8,000 licensed counselors on its platform, firmly establishing itself as a leading internet-based psychological counseling platform in China.
Recently, VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) conducted an exclusive interview with Xu Yingqi, founder and CEO of Yidianling, to hear his insights on doing business over the past three years.
Many readers are familiar with Yidianling, a pioneer among China’s internet-based psychological service platforms, which primarily serves individual consumers (C-end). Its service channels include a website and a mobile app, offering standard services such as emotional counseling, expert matching, and psychological assessments. Among these, emotional counseling and expert matching are Yidianling’s flagship offerings.
Yi Dian Ling Official Website
Yidianling APP
According to Xu Yingqi, Yi Dian Ling classifies users into different tiers based on their mental status. “For users with mental disorders or those requiring psychotherapy, we refer them to hospitals. Yi Dian Ling serves users seeking psychological counseling.”
Psychological Venting and Find an Expert are the combined strategies launched by Yidianling for psychological counseling. The Venting Hotline aims to provide users with immediate, short-term psychological counseling, with the goal of listening to and clarifying their concerns. Counselors identify whether users have psychological issues during the listening process, and this service is typically free. In contrast, Find an Expert offers more professional, long-term, or package-based paid psychological counseling services. The Venting Hotline has strong community attributes and is the most active section for registered users, while Find an Expert is akin to seeking medical advice and treatment, connecting clients with high-quality psychological counselors.
To date, the number of psychological counselors registered on Yidianling has exceeded 8,000, equivalent to hundreds of traditional psychological counseling clinics. Referring to the explosive growth in its counselor workforce, Xu Yingqi stated with pride, “Yidianling has instilled a sense of professional honor and accomplishment in psychological counselors.”
Psychological counseling has been developing in China for over two decades, with more than one million individuals obtaining licensed counselor credentials. However, the supporting infrastructure for the industry remains significantly underdeveloped. Licensed counselors face limited employment opportunities and are geographically dispersed, hindering systematic communication and professional learning among peers. Yi Dian Ling has established a learning and exchange platform for affiliated psychological counselors to regularly discuss practice-related challenges, thereby promoting professionalization and the development of personal brands.
“Yidianling’s user base is divided into two segments: external users, i.e., consumers; and internal users, i.e., licensed counselors on the platform.” In Xu Yingqi’s view, Yidianling aims to address three key user pain points.
First, public mindset. For platforms, the most challenging task is to enhance consumers’ awareness of the value that psychology can deliver to users. Xu Yingqi believes that consumers are still relatively unfamiliar with the consumption model for psychological counseling; the notion of “paying someone to chat” somewhat conflicts with their established consumption perceptions.
Second, industry standards. The training market for psychological counselors is uneven in quality, leading to inconsistent service levels, which is detrimental to the professional development of psychological counselors.
Third, service accessibility. Traditional psychological counselors engage in face-to-face consultations with clients at scheduled times and locations, which incurs high time costs for both parties. Moreover, when clients experience sudden psychological crises, counselors are often unable to provide timely intervention.
Xu Yingqi believes that innovative applications of internet tools within the framework of market rules can bridge the gaps in traditional psychological counseling.
Unconditional Refund
Yidianling pioneered the “unconditional refund” policy in China, aligning with consumers’ existing expectations while compelling the platform to enhance its service quality. On Yidianling, users can adopt a “service-first, payment-later” model: after selecting a service and a psychological counselor, they may receive the counseling first and make payment only after confirming that the services provided match their needs. Furthermore, if users feel that the outcomes of the paid psychological counseling deviate from their expected results, they can apply for a refund through the platform, thereby exercising their right to an “unconditional refund.”
“It is not easy to get more than 8,000 psychological counselors to accept ‘unconditional refunds,’” Xu Yingqi lamented.Yidianling implements a policy of “lenient entry, strict management” for psychological counselors. The platform sets only a low barrier to entry—obtaining a psychological counseling certification is sufficient. Once on the platform, counselors embark on a “leveling-up” journey: Level 1 involves providing free services to 1,000 users; Level 2 focuses on micro-counseling; Level 3 covers emotional support hotlines; and Level 4 entails formal psychological counseling. At each level, counselors undergo rigorous assessments and are assigned three supervisors specializing in professional supervision, personal growth supervision, and case supervision, with distinct upgrade criteria required at different stages.
Furthermore, Yidianling has established an elimination mechanism for psychological counselors; those who violate "ironclad rules" concerning ethics and user privacy will have their platform access revoked.
Multicultural Psychological Counselor
During the paid consultation session, Yidianling has strived to achieve diversity in its roster of psychological counselors. On one hand, aligning with the unique “leveling up” career progression path of psychological counselors, users can choose counselors of different tiers, resulting in varying fee structures. The lowest-priced paid consultation starts at just RMB 50 per hour, while the standard rate for most counselors is RMB 500 per hour. For counselors with extensive case experience and strong reputations, service fees reach RMB 1,000 per hour, or even RMB 1,200 per hour.
On the other hand, users’ psychological counseling needs span various dimensions, including marriage and family issues, parent-child relationships, workplace psychology, and adolescent mental health. To address each type of psychological counseling need, Yidianling has deployed a substantial number of licensed psychological counselors. “At times, users’ psychological counseling needs are highly personalized.”
Xu Yingqi noted that for users with overseas study experience, the platform assigns counselors with international backgrounds; for those working in sectors such as finance and media, it matches them with counselors possessing relevant domain expertise, thereby maximizing communication efficiency.
7×24-Hour Service
Unlike traditional psychological counselors who provide services only during working hours, counselors on Yidianling commit to offering 24/7 support. Users can reach out to their assigned counselor at any time when experiencing uncontrollable emotional fluctuations.
Xu Yingqi believes that 24/7 service is an essential characteristic of psychological counseling services tailored to the Chinese context. In the value systems and ethical frameworks of Western psychological counseling, counselors must maintain clear boundaries in their personal relationships with clients. In contrast, Chinese culture places significant emphasis on interpersonal emotional interaction; understanding precedes trust, forming the typical pathway for emotional transmission among Chinese individuals. Providing 24/7 service can narrow the distance between counselors and clients, thereby achieving better outcomes in psychological counseling.
Yidianling Hangzhou Center. Image provided by Yidianling
In terms of team management, Xu Yingqi places great emphasis on constraints at the level of awareness.“Our team shares a common vision and aligns with a shared mission, making management twice as effective with half the effort.” Furthermore,The learning and exchange between the internet and psychology teams serve as an excellent lubricant.
The core internet team at Yidianling primarily transitioned from Xu Yingqi’s first three entrepreneurial ventures. In Xu Yingqi’s words, they are all internet veterans who have led teams of over a hundred people and possess extensive practical experience. The psychology team, on the other hand, is composed of psychology professors from institutions such as the Institute of Psychology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Jilin University, and Wenzhou University. Xu Yingqi believes that the “Internet + Psychology” team is quite unique; although these are two entirely unrelated fields, the psychology team members are able to accurately interpret the thoughts of their internet counterparts and efficiently articulate their own perspectives.
“Psychology has become the glue that binds the two teams together,” Xu Yingqi said with a smile. “The greatest joy of entrepreneurship is having a great team working together toward a common goal.”
Standardization
Xu Yingqi pointed out that at Yi Dian Ling, most users are actually first-time contacts. "The first impression is crucial."Yidianling is striving to transition psychological services from a non-standardized model to a standardized one, providing users with more comprehensible and predictable service standards. This helps users establish more effective connections with psychological counselors, enabling them to gain a scientific understanding of the actual efficacy of psychological counseling, thereby reducing concerns and building trust.
Three-dimensional
In the future, users will require more than just simple psychological counseling. Providers of mental health services need to offer more diverse forms of content that align with users’ daily life scenarios. Examples include continuous monitoring of mood states, regular professional psychological assessments, and access to valuable psychology-focused lifestyle courses, thereby enabling users to enjoy comprehensive, multi-dimensional mental health services.
Intelligentization
In addition to requiring psychological counselors to “level up by defeating monsters” and cultivate theirNeigong" In addition, Yidianling is also attempting to leverage intelligent technologies to provide counselors with external support. For instance, it conducts big data analysis to enable counselors to promptly monitor changes in users' psychological conditions. Furthermore, by installing smart cameras, it can accurately capture users' emotional fluctuations. For users with autism spectrum disorder, Yidianling offers an AI chatbot function to help them gradually# Relieve Mood, Release Stress。
Since its establishment in 2015, YiDianLing has obtainedFour rounds of financing, nearlyRecently, the tens of millions in Series A+ financing have also been completed, gaining high recognition in both the capital market and the consumer market.
Data Source: VCBeat Database
As the interview drew to a close, Xu Yingqi revealed that Yidianling would intensify its R&D efforts and gradually expand into the B2B and G2B (government) markets. The spring of the psychological counseling industry is quietly arriving. Over the past 30 years, Chinese psychology has cultivated substantial momentum alongside social and temporal progress. As a platform, Yidianling bears the responsibility of connecting this industry strength fostered by psychology with the needs of the general public. Meanwhile, Xu Yingqi stated, “It is gratifying that over the three years since we launched our platform, we have clearly sensed that Chinese people’s recognition of the value of psychological services is rising steadily, and their expression of demand for such services is becoming increasingly normalized.”
Related Links to the Mental Health + Case Series Special Topics:
Selected Reports on the Mental Health Industry:
【AI + Mental Health】Widespread Anxiety: Can AI-Driven Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Be of Use?