70s-born Veteran Carves a Niche in Maternal & Child Health Education: Yizhi Daishu Explores Three Revenue Models

Mr. Dong Zhan, Founder of Beijing Yipu Culture Media Co., Ltd. and Creator of the “Yizhi Daishu” Brand

Born in the 1970s and a native of Beijing, Dong Zhan decided to change career paths after 15 years in medical academic promotion. In December 2014, he entered the field of popular science on maternal and infant health. In March 2015, he officially founded the brand “Yi Zhi Dai Shu.”

Hearing that Dong Zhan was starting a business, many doctors who had been close friends for years came to show their support with just one phone call. It wasn’t a career change; he was still working in the medical industry, but he planned to pioneer new paths through maternal and infant content.

With the national rollout of the two-child policy, the maternal and infant market has heated up. As a lucrative opportunity emerged, entrepreneurs with keen business acumen flocked to the sector in large numbers. How to launch quickly? Some have focused on specialized consulting, targeting high-end users; others have ventured into e-commerce, continuously upgrading product categories and shopping experiences; while major players in maternal and infant communities have solidified their positions and are now exploring ways to break through revenue ceilings, among other strategies. Dong Zhan’s “Yi Zhi Dai Shu” (Medical Knowledge Kangaroo) started with popular science and health education for mothers and infants, struggling to survive in a niche market. The past two years have been arduous, but fortunately, the company has weathered the storm.

Entrepreneurs with a background in academic promotion possess an inherent advantage: they have established close relationships with physicians. Dong Zhan told VCBeat, “Since 2002, I have been collaborating with medical associations, hospitals, and pharmaceutical companies, getting to know many healthcare professionals. These are all renowned pediatricians and obstetrician-gynecologists; we have attended numerous conferences together and are extremely familiar with one another.” Therefore, leveraging his foundation in training and educating primary care physicians, Dong Zhan can communicate seamlessly with doctors. By the end of 2014, when launching science popularization and education initiatives, he faced no shortage of physician resources. Physicians, who are typically cautious, tend to place greater trust in acquaintances. This constitutes the exclusive advantage of Yizhi Daishu (Medical Knowledge Kangaroo), which indeed cannot be bought even with money.

Moreover, in the era of information explosion, popular science content on maternal and infant health is mixed with misinformation, and much of it is inaccurate. Even some influential key opinion leaders (KOLs) in the field of women’s and children’s health often produce content that lacks rigor. Given the scarcity of expert resources, those who can ensure accuracy at the source will build trustworthy content ventures that resonate with audiences. Ultimately, this endeavor relies on frontline obstetricians, gynecologists, and pediatricians. The opportunity is right before us, even if it is not the most optimal window of time.

Conveniently, Yizhi Daishu has no shortage of obstetricians, gynecologists, and pediatricians!

With so many popular science platforms for mothers and infants, each has its own loyal following. Breaking through from the fierce red ocean requires genuine strength. When asked about the differences between Yizhi Daishu and other platforms, or even individual doctor IP self-media, Dong Zhan told VCBeat with a sincere tone, not arrogant at all.

“On our platform, there are over 100 physicians at the level of department director or above from Grade A tertiary hospitals. We have experts in every specialty, including respiratory medicine, gastroenterology, dermatology, neurology, and neurosurgery. For instance, respiratory specialists on Yizhi Daishu focus exclusively on respiratory topics and do not stray into areas such as dermatology, even if they possess knowledge in those fields.” Specialization is key. Dong Zhan believes that this approach is essential to delivering health education of the highest quality. It would clearly exceed a pediatrician’s scope of practice to cover all medical specialties.

Currently, Yizhi Daishu has partnered with multiple hospitals, onboarded over 100 physicians, and established the Yizhi Daishu Science Popularization Expert Committee.

With the involvement of physicians, Yizhi Daishu has gained confidence in its content and topic planning. Currently, the platform adheres to three content curation standards. First, it identifies and addresses common questions encountered by doctors during outpatient consultations. Second, dedicated operations staff screen frequently asked questions from users on the backend—such as parenting concerns—and invite experts to provide regular answers. Third, for trending topics like vaccines and infectious diseases, content is produced and published as rapidly as possible. The platform covers all stages of maternal and child health, including pre-conception and prenatal guidance, healthcare during pregnancy, health management for children aged 0–3, and chronic disease management for children aged 3–14 and older.

The content initially began with videos. In February 2015, the self-produced children’s health science popularization video series “Healthy Growth Diary” was launched. Featuring expert lectures in a cartoon style, the series covered common pediatric diseases, infant feeding, and critical care emergencies, providing clear and accessible explanations to address parents’ questions. Subsequently, the “Yi Zhi Dai Shu” brand was established in March 2015, followed by the launch of its WeChat official account and official website in April of the same year. In recognition of its high-quality content, “Healthy Growth Diary” received special funding for science popularization from the Beijing Municipal Science & Technology Commission at the end of 2015.

While developing its owned media channels, Yizhi Daishu has partnered with Tencent, LeTV, Toutiao, NetEase, Sohu Mother & Baby, Youku, iQIYI, Ximalaya, and various mother-and-baby communities. This strategy focuses on professional generated content (PGC) production while achieving comprehensive coverage across the entire internet.

“In fact, in the beginning, our customer acquisition channels mainly came from these distribution platforms. With content in various formats such as videos, animations, comics, and audio, the total number of clicks across the entire network exceeded 200 million. This is a significant volume, which has played a certain role in brand promotion. Of course, the most fundamental aspect remains the quality of the content. In 2017, we will also explore deeper cooperation with distribution platforms.”

In July 2016, the user-generated video series “Expectant Mothers’ Growth Journey” was launched, focusing primarily on preconception care, prenatal health, labor and delivery guidance, and postpartum recovery. The premiere episode garnered over one million views across the entire Chinese internet. Clearly, in terms of content, YiZhi DaiShu has grown into a robust and promising new player.

“We’re hiring, immediately. We need to recruit some new senior editors, as the medical field is evolving too rapidly,” said Dong Zhan.

This is the golden age of content entrepreneurship, and Yizhi Daishu has firmly seized content as its lifeline. The quality of our content relies on two key groups: physicians and Yizhi Daishu’s senior editorial and operations team.

As previously mentioned, these physicians are affiliated with the Chinese Medical Association, the Pediatric Branch of the Chinese Medical Doctor Association, and the China Maternal and Child Health Care Association. Renowned experts in maternal, infant, and child health from top-tier (Grade 3A) hospitals—including the Capital Institute of Pediatrics, Beijing Children’s Hospital, Peking University First Hospital, and Peking Union Medical College Hospital—have also lent their endorsement to Yizhi Daishu. With physicians serving as editorial directors to oversee content, the platform ensures both authority and scientific rigor.

Currently, the Yizhi Daishu team has four senior content strategists who are specifically responsible for content creation, serving dual roles as content planners and physician liaisons. When developing content, they engage in iterative communication with physicians to ensure both professional accuracy and readability, making the material suitable for public health education.

The scope of content is expanding. Young physicians are highly motivated, with doctors from different departments referring one another. Under the broader policy allowing multi-site practice, there is a strong determination to engage in public health education and build personal brands. YiZhi DaiShu provides such a platform.

“The current situation is that the number of doctors is growing too rapidly, exceeding 100, with the majority being young physicians. Our platform-wide promotion of doctors has significantly enhanced both their personal brands and those of their affiliated hospitals, reaching at least 300,000 people daily. Some doctors are even generating demand for premium consultations, straining our planning capacity. The expansion pace of our team is lagging behind the growth in the number of doctors,” disclosed Dong Zhan, adding that customer service representatives would be recruited once consultation volumes increase.

In September 2016, the Yizhi Daishu WeChat platform launched the “Ask Dr. Kangaroo” rapid Q&A feature. Currently, the Yizhi Daishu WeChat backend receives approximately 600 free consultation inquiries per day.

As the number of doctors increased, Yizhi Daishu’s positioning underwent some changes. By the end of 2016, in addition to producing high-quality content, the platform placed greater emphasis on serving physicians well and developing content strategies centered around them. “This is currently a widely recognized model for maternal and child health platforms within the industry, and it represents our competitive advantage.”

By focusing on serving physicians, a major benefit is the significant increase in user stickiness. Once users develop trust in a platform and its experts, they are unlikely to switch to other platforms easily. “We reach at least 300,000 people daily. As our user coverage expands, the number of users on our proprietary platform is rising linearly. More importantly, user loyalty remains very high.”

So, how does Yizhi Daishu achieve profitability? Dong Zhan revealed to the reporter: “Initially, like all other maternal and infant platforms, we generated revenue from advertising. In 2016, our net revenue exceeded RMB 1 million. As of the end of February this year, our gross merchandise volume has surpassed RMB 500,000. In addition, we collaborate with physicians and enterprises to organize paid offline events and online open courses. In 2017, we will also partner with Ximalaya to develop paid audio services.”

Focusing on obstetricians, gynecologists, and pediatricians, the potential for collaborative models is limitless, allowing Yizhi Daishu to remain unburdened by monetization pressures. This year, in alignment with the national policy on integrating medicine and sports, we will progressively launch initiatives and establish industry standards. “We will gradually roll out services aimed at monetization or enhancing user stickiness.”

In January 2017, the Yizhi Daishu Popular Science Expert Team partnered with Tengai Doctor, a third-party technology platform, to launch paid consultation services, thereby reducing the capital and time required for platform development.

Why did we venture into the red ocean of online consultations? Dong Zhan stated, “Initially, we had no intention of doing so. However, after promoting our physicians’ brands and ensuring that all published content was attributed to the respective doctors, we received a massive volume of inquiries from users asking, ‘What should I do if I have this condition?’ Given the overwhelming demand, we launched our consultation services. We felt that not offering such services would constitute a waste of both our physicians’ expertise and available medical resources.”

This type of online consultation is largely built on trust between doctors and patients. Reporters have learned that the average transaction value per consultation is not high, with the most expensive consultations priced at only 100 yuan. However, Dong Zhan stated, “Paid online consultations are merely one of our revenue streams, emerging naturally as part of our business model. The key lies in leveraging physicians’ expertise to address patients’ real-world health concerns. The extent of our growth will ultimately depend on the service capabilities of our doctors.”

In 2017, Yizhi Daishu will continue to prioritize physicians, while adopting a more strategic approach to content promotion, physician recruitment, and revenue generation, with the aim of enhancing the experience for both doctors and consumers. Dong Zhan revealed that the company plans to engage with more potential investors this year.

Doctors disseminate popular science, users access it, and we serve doctors well. In 2017, YiZhiDaiShu was just getting started in the field of maternal and child health education.

Note: The relevant data in the article were provided by the respondents.