Motoko’s weblog

Yes, it’s true. I’m not joking here. According to the survey I just saw, more than 40% of people participated in the survey (16000 people) bring a cell phone to a bath when they soak in the tub. (In Japan, people soak in tub pretty much every day.)

Many of them said that they e-mail/text in a tub, and also listen to the music with cell phone. Though not many said that they browse web sites at this time, I’m sure it will catch up especially since many of them are already checking e-mails. All they need is to receive some e-mails from friends about some interesting sites. They may soon searching a product they just saw on TV commercials before they came to take a bath. It’s a known fact that people are most likely to be on Internet after 10pm at home in Japan, but this mobile Internet trend is already changing that data.

Anyway, being water resistant got to be one of the must-have features of cell phone in Japan.

I just came back from a little short of 3 weeks Japan trip. Everywhere I went, it seemed that Internet has become more and more a part of Japanese people’s lives. The search box was still very popular in ads. The QR code seemed to completely took over the bar-code as it was used on food packages, on appliance labels, etc. I even saw it on business cards!

The Internet penetration rate in Japan is very high (70%). However, especially in a country side and for older generations, it can still be a little intimidating. To help these people using Internet, I saw places like City Hall, Legal Affairs Bureau and Tax Agency set up several PCs in the office for people to file paper works online with the assistance of office staffs.

I also realized that something never change. E-mail may replaced written letters in many cases, but in occasions like weddings and funerals, it’s still very important to many people to follow the traditional manners. The problem is that younger generations have no idea of how to go about it, and that’s when Internet comes in handy. In fact, those how-to websites in the special occasions and forums are very popular in Japan. You don’t want to give only 5,000yen, when you are expected to give 10,000yen, and make sure that a ribbon on the package points the right way. People are going to talk, and you know how quickly those talks would spread!

One day at a restaurant, I saw a discount info on a table. In US, it’s too late for that day, and hope to remember to access the site to print out a coupon for the next time. But in Japan, you can scan the QR code on the discount ad on a table with your cell phone, and show what comes up at the register to receive the discount. In many occasions, I was reminded how Japanese businesses were willing to make things easier for customers. To be successful in Japanese market, improving the usability of your website is definitely one of the key points.

When I was speaking at SES London, I started to lose my voice after 5 min. or so in. Yes, it’s just my luck. I apologize to people came to the session, I didn’t sound good at all. While I was speaking, I couldn’t help myself but calling “riiiiicolaaaaa” in my head. Now, that’s the power of advertising and marketing, isn’t it? The search is great, and it’s going to be even better, but in my opinion, it will never replace TV ads. Through the search, the businesses can only connect to people if and when they happen to search what you offer. On the other hand, TV ads push what they want you to know, again and again. Then I was thinking, what would be the closest thing on Internet to TV ads… Perhaps it’s the banner ads, but we all know that many banner ads are ignored, people skip right over the ads and read what they want to read on the page. It’s like when people skip TV commercials and surf channels. Those paid ads can be effective, then again, it only works when someone is searching for it. What works really well and similar to TV commercials maybe those “word-of-mouth” marketing and ads. It’s what they talk about on blogs and what’s on videos that your friends send you. You may not be searching for it, but it comes to your way from your friends and your favorite bloggers in the form of text (blog), images and videos. The thing is that while you may not always buy things you see on TV, you are more likely to try something that your friends recommend.

According to Yano Financial, “Kuchikomi blog” (word-of-mouth blog) advertising market in Japan grew to more than 3 billion yen market in 2007 from 0.9 billion yen market in 2006. Their another survey shows that more than 80% of net users have actively taken the advise/information they got through “word-of-mouth” on the net. Almost 50% of female in 30s responded that they talk to other people about their experiences and opinions about the products and the services that they purchased. In 2008, success of ad campaign may be up to how well you incorporate word-of-mouth campaign into your cross marketing strategies.