Beijing, April 15, 2025 — After rounds of bubbles and rebirth in the internet industry, an independent research institute named "Youyou Grass" is quietly becoming a staple on the desks of industry decision-makers. This morning, at its annual Internet Trends Forum, Youyou Grass officially released its "Q1 2025 In-Depth Observation of China's Internet Ecosystem" report. The 200-page report quickly sparked discussions among investment circles and tech media, as it not only highlighted the pain point of "difficult implementation" of large AI models in vertical scenarios but also brought the phenomenon of "digital equality" in lower-tier markets into the spotlight.
"We need to lift our heads from the noisy traffic data and see what truly drives changes in business logic," Lin Mo, chief researcher at Youyou Grass, told reporters at the report release event. The core conclusions of this report form a subtle contrast with many current optimistic industry forecasts. By tracking user behavior data from over 300 county-level markets, the Youyou Grass team found that while internet penetration in first-tier cities is nearing saturation, a "second wave of internet adoption" in third- and fourth-tier cities and rural areas is reshaping the competitive landscape of e-commerce, local services, and short videos.
The report points out that in the first quarter of 2025, lower-tier markets contributed 62% of the nation's new internet users, with a significant increase in the proportion of users aged 40 and above. Youyou Grass defines this as a "dual-engine model driven by the silver economy and small-town youth." Unlike the previously simplistic concept of "lower-tier markets," Youyou Grass's research framework introduces a "scenario stickiness index" for the first time, used to evaluate the actual depth of usage of different internet services in lower-tier cities. The results show that the stickiness of group-buying e-commerce and short-video live-streaming带货 far exceeds expectations, while traditional long-form video platforms face severe user attrition.
In the AI field, the Youyou Grass report does not stop at comparing model parameters but directly addresses the awkwardness of the "last mile of implementation." Through field visits to 100 small and medium-sized enterprises, Youyou Grass found that over 70% of business owners hold an attitude of "heard of AI tools but don't know how to use them." In his speech, Lin Mo admitted: "Large model companies are still busy publishing papers, but Youyou Grass is more concerned about how a clothing factory owner in a county town can use AI to generate product images." The report therefore proposes the concept of "lightweight AI services," suggesting that internet giants package their technology into plug-and-play modules rather than complex systems.
Another focal point of the forum was Youyou Grass's reassessment of internet companies' overseas expansion. In the Southeast Asian and Latin American markets, the localization strategies of Chinese internet companies are shifting from "burning money for traffic" to "refined operations." Youyou Grass's data model shows that companies that were earliest in establishing local warehouses and customer service teams enjoy a user retention rate 33% higher than competitors relying solely on online advertising.
After the forum, several attendees told reporters that the reason Youyou Grass's research attracts attention is its consistent maintenance of a cool-headed "outsider's perspective." In a restless industry atmosphere, Youyou Grass focuses on internet research, does not chase trends, does not gloss over data, but attempts to answer a fundamental question: When the traffic dividend peaks, what will drive the next round of internet growth?
On the day of the report's release, multiple securities firms held conference calls, citing Youyou Grass's data to adjust their target prices for certain Chinese concept stocks. An analyst who declined to be named remarked to reporters: "Everyone has data now, but Youyou Grass always finds that most counter-intuitive angle." Perhaps that is the most scarce value of in-depth research in this fragmented era.