As of December 8, there are 40 million users for Google+ worldwide. In the case of Japan, as in the previous article Vol.64 – Facebook and Twitter vs. LinkedIn and Google+ in Japan Google+ has mostly been dominated by a small portion of early adaptors even after it became open to the public, and there are only 2 million users for Google+ in Japan.
However, according to what Mr. Bradley Horowitz, a VP of Google said to Japanese media on December 9 when he visited Japan, it is likely that at last Google+ is to breakout in Japan at last with an extremely strategic promotion plan, which is alliance with a very popular Japanese pop group called AK48.
1. Why Google+ did not outbreak until today in Japan?
One reason is the fact that it is only recently that global social media such as Twitter and Facebook became popular in Japan and therefore Japanese people have been still at the point in which they are still learning and enjoying Twitter and Facebook. This would make them unable to think of starting another new social media now.
Another reason, according to some comments the author had from her Japanese online friends, seems mostly is the fact that most Japanese online users currently enjoying Twitter and Facebook including those with high IT literacy (e.g. experts in web marketing and social media) could not really understand the functions and user friendly operations of Google+.
This may attribute to the fact that there were few online articles in Japanese explaining such things. With the same reason, most Japanese online users did not (and probably still do not) understand the benefit of Google+, i.e. functions and services (including potential) integrating with other Google products and services as well.
2. What kind of impact the alliance with AK48 has on Google+, the most popular pop group in Japan today?
It will surely have an enormous positive impact on Google+ expansion in Japan. AK48, a pop group of many young girls, is currently the most popular pop group in Japan. The most popular member of the group has been acting as the heroine of a TV drama based on a comic that became extremely popular in Japan. China has created their pop group referring AK48.
Using a popular TV star, singer or pop group is a very popular promotion strategy adopted by many Japanese companies engaged in business such as AV products and beverages and they have mostly been successful. Therefore, leveraging the popularity of AK48 would surely boost the proliferation of Google+ in Japan.
3. How is Google+ to be promoted by AK48?
The promotion is to be done leveraging a function of Google+ of “Hang Out”, with which maximum of 10 online users can enjoy video chat.
AK48 members is to leverage the function to interact with their fans to regain the concept of “TV start that their fans can meet and interact” online. The group used to be designed to be close with their fans, interacting with them. However, because the group became very popular, it became extremely difficult for their fans to meet and interact with the group. The function would be a solution and Google say that AK48 and Google+ is a “perfect match”.
4. How effective Google+ promotion likely be compared with Facebook promotion in Japan?
The author would say that the both are equally effective; it is simply that the both are different.
Facebook leveraged the founder, Mr. Mark Zuckerberg in promoting Facebook worldwide including Japan, which is a good strategy. Mark was chosen as the man of the year by a leading business magazine Times for 2010. Then in January 2011 there were much coverage about Facebook in Japan. The movie about Facebook “Social Network” started to run in Japan from January 2011. And the Japanese version book about Mark was published in March 2011.
In the case of Google+, the follower in SNS without a person equivalent to Mark of Facebook, they just had to take a different approach. In the case of Japan market, the author understands that Google came up with a popular approach take in Japan which is adopting a popular TV star or pop group in their promotion. And in the current situation in Japan, AK48 is a good option to attract the attention of the general public.
In fact, already as of December 10, many of the favourite content of Google+ in Japan are the taste of AK48, which implies that many online users of AK48 fans have registered Google+ and started using it. A Japanese IT expert who started his business in Silicon Valley and has been providing latest information about IT to Japanese audience commented “I had a look at the status of Google+ favourite content after a long time and was surprised how the trend changed after the announcement of the alliance of Google+ with AK48!”
5. What are the author’s final thoughts?
In addition to products and services, promotion also is an important factor for the success of marketing and business. There is no one-fit-for-all promotion strategy, though.
Breakout of Google+ in Japan is a great news just that for some people (e.g. those who would like to use mainly for business) they may need to be extremely careful who to circle and/or follow on Google+ to make sure that they create their Google+ community that meet their needs.
References:-
Google+ has 2 million users in Japan, “a business opportunity for the follower” says a Google VP (in Japanese)
http://nlab.itmedia.co.jp/nl/articles/1112/09/news091.html
Resources:-
Google+ has been mainly dominated by early adopters in Japan and was not popular even among many Japanese with high IT literacy because they did not understand the good functions, user friendliness and (potential) benefits provided by integration with other Google products/services attributing to lack of explanation of such issues. However, with recent announcement of alliance with AK48, the most popular pop group in Japan today, Google+ is likely to outbreak at last in Japan. Already some general public seem to have started to join Google+.
Saturday, 10 December 2011
Saturday, 26 November 2011
Vol.70 – After 1 Month of LinkedIn Japanese Service Announcement
As a follow-up article of the previous article Vol.69 – Requirements for LinkedIn to Popularize and Take Root in Japan, the author would like to provide some updates on how LinkedIn is perceived in Japan after the announcement of the start of Japanese service on October 20.
This is mostly based on some of the feedback she had when she gave a seminar she was asked to give by a NPO about how to start LinkedIn to a small group of Japanese people in the evening of November 25 in Osaka, Japan where she lives.
1. Who participated in the seminar?
The participants of the seminar were mostly small and mid-sized business owners who have already been using Twitter and Facebook in Japanese. They also have been blogging in Japanese using one of the leading blogging platforms in Japan (i.e. not WordPress and Blogger).
They were mostly from Osaka but to the author’s surprise there were a pair of people from the same company from eastern Japan, saying that they had a business meeting in Osaka. The author was informed that there were a few others from places like Tottori (Japan Sea Coastal area) who wanted to join as well but could not because they would have to take a day off to travel to Osaka.
2. Why did they decide to participate in the seminar?
It was because they were very much interested in what LinkedIn is and they strongly feel it would be beneficial in their business but they do not quite know what it is and how to start.
Actually the person who asked the author to give the seminar had opened up his LinkedIn account and filled his title but he was at a loss how to proceed further, which was the reason for the request to the author.
The author assumes that such situation mostly attributes to the fact that there has not been promotion (only to selected tech journalists) nor featured articles in media about LinkedIn targeting the mass audience of the Japanese people.
3. What are the possible hurdles of Japanese people starting LinkedIn?
In addition to no promotion nor featured articles by the media, the possible hurdles are as below.
1) Few people know how to switch to Japanese from English
There is a link button in the bottom right of the display to change the language; however, few people know about it. Even the author did not know about it until she was told by one of her LinkedIn friend in one of the group discussion. The organizer of the seminar said “mekara urokoga deta (did not know about it and was impressed with the information)” when the author made the demonstration of the language selection in the seminar.
In the case of Facebook and Twitter, the language selection is done automatically so most of us assume it is the same for LinkedIn but that is not the case. This fact needs to be communicated otherwise people would likely to think that the Japanese service announce was made but the service has not yet started.
2) The benefits of LinkedIn and basic features are not understood
Global social media/SNS and leveraging them in business (e.g. marketing and recruiting) has only started to spread among innovative companies and organizations in the last year or two in Japan.
This means that benefits of leveraging business SNS to business and why with explanation of some basic features needs to be explained with demonstration. Such demonstration would help people to understand the user interface of LinkedIn also.
3) Group discussions remain in English
User interface is now available in Japanese but currently group discussions are in English. Limited Japanese people have been involved in discussion before the start of the Japanese service attributing to language barrier (high level English communication skill is required to proactively participate in LnkedIn group discussion in addition to knowledge of the topic).
In the case of Facebook, it was mainly used by bilingual people to communicate with their English speaking friends and it was when many Japanese people without English communication skill started to open their Facebook account AND started to interact in Japanese after Facebook was introduced in media etc. that Facebook became popular among Japanese people.
This means that more Japanese people (not necessarily bilingual) joining LinkedIn and systems/environment in which they can interact in Japanese are some of the main requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan.
3. The author’s final thoughts
In addition to the above hurdles, there are also social factors as mentioned in the previous article Vol.69 – Requirements for LinkedIn to Popularize and Take Root in Japan and other factors, and some people doubt that LinkedIn would become popular in Japan.
However, the environment for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan is gradually being developed. With the outbreak of Twitter in 2010, Japanese general public have ready to accept global social media. With the outbreak of Facebook in January 2011, Japanese general public have come to be comfortable in using their real names, when anonymity used to dominate in blogging/SNS world in Japan.
And use of social media (especially SNS such as Facebook) in business such as marketing and recruiting new graduates now has become one of the hottest topics in Japan. This is when with depressive Japanese economy and high yen, Japanese companies are seeking new business opportunities abroad meaning a motivator of leveraging global SNS specialized in business.
Resources:-
After 1 month of the LinkedIn’s announcement of Japanese service, some hurdles for Japanese general public starting LinkedIn started to become clear. This includes few people know how to switch to Japanese from English, the benefits of LinkedIn and basic features are not understood, and group discussions remain in English, in addition to lack of promotion and introduction in featured articles in media. Some people doubt whether LinkedIn will become popular in Japan; however, the author believes more Japanese people will start using it because they now are happy to accept global social media using real names and many Japanese companies are now planning to use social media in business.
This is mostly based on some of the feedback she had when she gave a seminar she was asked to give by a NPO about how to start LinkedIn to a small group of Japanese people in the evening of November 25 in Osaka, Japan where she lives.
1. Who participated in the seminar?
The participants of the seminar were mostly small and mid-sized business owners who have already been using Twitter and Facebook in Japanese. They also have been blogging in Japanese using one of the leading blogging platforms in Japan (i.e. not WordPress and Blogger).
They were mostly from Osaka but to the author’s surprise there were a pair of people from the same company from eastern Japan, saying that they had a business meeting in Osaka. The author was informed that there were a few others from places like Tottori (Japan Sea Coastal area) who wanted to join as well but could not because they would have to take a day off to travel to Osaka.
2. Why did they decide to participate in the seminar?
It was because they were very much interested in what LinkedIn is and they strongly feel it would be beneficial in their business but they do not quite know what it is and how to start.
Actually the person who asked the author to give the seminar had opened up his LinkedIn account and filled his title but he was at a loss how to proceed further, which was the reason for the request to the author.
The author assumes that such situation mostly attributes to the fact that there has not been promotion (only to selected tech journalists) nor featured articles in media about LinkedIn targeting the mass audience of the Japanese people.
3. What are the possible hurdles of Japanese people starting LinkedIn?
In addition to no promotion nor featured articles by the media, the possible hurdles are as below.
1) Few people know how to switch to Japanese from English
There is a link button in the bottom right of the display to change the language; however, few people know about it. Even the author did not know about it until she was told by one of her LinkedIn friend in one of the group discussion. The organizer of the seminar said “mekara urokoga deta (did not know about it and was impressed with the information)” when the author made the demonstration of the language selection in the seminar.
In the case of Facebook and Twitter, the language selection is done automatically so most of us assume it is the same for LinkedIn but that is not the case. This fact needs to be communicated otherwise people would likely to think that the Japanese service announce was made but the service has not yet started.
2) The benefits of LinkedIn and basic features are not understood
Global social media/SNS and leveraging them in business (e.g. marketing and recruiting) has only started to spread among innovative companies and organizations in the last year or two in Japan.
This means that benefits of leveraging business SNS to business and why with explanation of some basic features needs to be explained with demonstration. Such demonstration would help people to understand the user interface of LinkedIn also.
3) Group discussions remain in English
User interface is now available in Japanese but currently group discussions are in English. Limited Japanese people have been involved in discussion before the start of the Japanese service attributing to language barrier (high level English communication skill is required to proactively participate in LnkedIn group discussion in addition to knowledge of the topic).
In the case of Facebook, it was mainly used by bilingual people to communicate with their English speaking friends and it was when many Japanese people without English communication skill started to open their Facebook account AND started to interact in Japanese after Facebook was introduced in media etc. that Facebook became popular among Japanese people.
This means that more Japanese people (not necessarily bilingual) joining LinkedIn and systems/environment in which they can interact in Japanese are some of the main requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan.
3. The author’s final thoughts
In addition to the above hurdles, there are also social factors as mentioned in the previous article Vol.69 – Requirements for LinkedIn to Popularize and Take Root in Japan and other factors, and some people doubt that LinkedIn would become popular in Japan.
However, the environment for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan is gradually being developed. With the outbreak of Twitter in 2010, Japanese general public have ready to accept global social media. With the outbreak of Facebook in January 2011, Japanese general public have come to be comfortable in using their real names, when anonymity used to dominate in blogging/SNS world in Japan.
And use of social media (especially SNS such as Facebook) in business such as marketing and recruiting new graduates now has become one of the hottest topics in Japan. This is when with depressive Japanese economy and high yen, Japanese companies are seeking new business opportunities abroad meaning a motivator of leveraging global SNS specialized in business.
Resources:-
After 1 month of the LinkedIn’s announcement of Japanese service, some hurdles for Japanese general public starting LinkedIn started to become clear. This includes few people know how to switch to Japanese from English, the benefits of LinkedIn and basic features are not understood, and group discussions remain in English, in addition to lack of promotion and introduction in featured articles in media. Some people doubt whether LinkedIn will become popular in Japan; however, the author believes more Japanese people will start using it because they now are happy to accept global social media using real names and many Japanese companies are now planning to use social media in business.
Saturday, 22 October 2011
Vol.69 – Requirements for LinkedIn to Popularize and Take Root in Japan
The author had said that LinkedIn is not yet so popular in Japan and one of the requirements for LinkedIn to become popular is localization in the previous article Vol.64 – Facebook and Twitter vs. LinkedIn and Google+ in Japan. The rumour that Japanese version will be rolled out in June immediately after a small office in Tokyo was set up had spread among Japanese online users but it did not come to reality then.
Earlier this month the author happened to start a LinkedIn discussion asking group members what they think are possible requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan. There were quite a number of interesting comments including localization, i.e. implementing Japanese version.
And then on October 20, the announcement was made that LinkedIn is to enter Japan market, providing Japanese version, committing to engage in business in Japan in the long-term.
Japan is now LinkedIN
Now the Japanese version is available, the author would like to present some possible requirements for it to become popular in Japan.
1. Further localization
Language localization is the basic but not the only localization. Content and services also need to be localized, meeting local needs based on such things as manners and customs, job market, and work environment.
Such possible examples include content and services collaborating with “Hello Work”, the employment bureau initiated and managed by the Japanese government. This is a nationwide network of offices where people without jobs go and seek support in finding a job. The staff members consult and make utmost efforts to introduce a suitable job opportunity.
This might be what non-Japanese companies operating in Japan that post job opportunities in LinkedIn (and executive search agencies) would not like. However, Hello Work cannot be neglected in any discussions and/or initiatives in Japan’s job market, and the author feels that the job seekers who gain support from Hello Work and who leverage executive search firms are of different segments in the job market so both Hello Work and non-Japanese companies operating in Japan could co-exist.
2. Mobility of human resources
One primary characteristics of Japan’s job market is little mobility and limited people seeking job opportunities after they have joined a company. This mostly attributes to lifetime employment system, one of the main characteristics of traditional companies in Japan along with seniority system.
Under such systems, job hopping used to be extremely rare in Japan and for example even the author, who currently works for her second employer, never thought of changing her employer/career when she joined her first employer, a typical Japanese company that represents Japanese consumer electronics industry, in 1990s. It was the burst of the bubble economy around 1993 that such systems started to collapse to trigger growth of career-change market in Japan. This was further driven by some examples of success people working in non-Japanese companies operating in Japan who once started their career in Japanese traditional companies.
Having said that, career change is still the minority in Japan and mobility of human resources is still limited and therefore changing this situation is another critical requirement for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan. This is because one of the main uses of LinkedIn is discovering target human resources and opportunities, and first and upmost of such use is in recruiting. Of course, others include job seeking and finding business partners.
The author would like to add that although human resource mobility is still far behind in Japan, there are quite a few Japanese people working for Japanese companies who work globally and at least for such people LinkedIn could be an optimum online community for business networking.
3. More Japanese companies leverage social media in business
In general, work environment in many Japanese traditional companies does not encourage using social media compared to many western companies so changing this is another requirement for LinkedIn to become popular.
As mentioned in the previous article Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS, 2011 is the first era of SNS (social media) in Japan so first Japanese companies need to start leveraging social media in their business.
It is only as recent as this year that some innovative Japanese companies such as Honda started leveraging Facebook in recruiting new graduates, as introduced in the previous article Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan. Also it is only from 2010 that some companies such as Fast Retailing (famous for UniQlo brand) started leveraging Facebook in their marketing.
Such companies are still minority in Japan, and even such companies still have not started using LinkedIn. Such companies first need to start using LinkedIn as innovators in this realm and more Japanese companies need to start leveraging social media in business.
4. Change in mindset of companies and individuals
#2 and #3 mentioned above cannot be fulfilled unless companies and individuals change their mindset.
They would need to be fully aware the power and benefit of effective use of social media. Companies need to set rules regarding privacy and use of social media and in work environment with such rules companies need to be comfortable disclosing their information online and be open to potential employees, business partners and customers.
And in the same work environment, individuals also need to be comfortable disclosing their information (work experience, education etc.) while securing their company information. This means individuals moving out from general preference of anonymity, which is critical in being a member of an online community of professionals.
What encourages companies and individuals change their mindset include introducing successful case studies. This could be of western countries but those of Japanese companies are far more convincing in Japan where lock-step mentality strongly prevails. Also, similarly to how (traditional) media played an important role making Facebook and Twitter to outbreak, exposure to (traditional) media is extremely effective in attracting awareness of the majority of the Japanese.
5. The author’s final thoughts
It is not only about LinkedIn that are the main possible requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan and for that reason it is likely to take time and much efforts for LinkedIn to take root in Japan. The author feels that the change in the mindset of the companies and individuals is the biggest factor.
When localization in all aspects is complete, the key would be “promotions”. This requires LinkedIn evangelists, who are to strategically plan and implement such promotions similarly to any other marketing communication strategy. In doing so, benefits and points that differentiates LinkedIn from other social media for business use needs to be delivered.
Last but not least, social media is a tool or means to achieve something and LinkedIn is of effective business and marketing and to the author LinkedIn provides the best solution to solve business issues. For this reason, if the author were one of the evangelists, she would stress such things in core message and introduce ROI and outcome of leveraging LinkedIn when introducing successful cases.
Resources:-
After an office was set up in Tokyo in May, LinkedIn officially announced on October 20 that they will start providing Japanese version and to enter Japan market. Language localization is one but not only requirements for LinkedIn to become popular. Other possible requirements include localization of content and services, mobilization of human resources in job market and more Japanese companies leveraging social media, all of which require change in mindset of the companies and the individuals.
Earlier this month the author happened to start a LinkedIn discussion asking group members what they think are possible requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan. There were quite a number of interesting comments including localization, i.e. implementing Japanese version.
And then on October 20, the announcement was made that LinkedIn is to enter Japan market, providing Japanese version, committing to engage in business in Japan in the long-term.
Japan is now LinkedIN
Now the Japanese version is available, the author would like to present some possible requirements for it to become popular in Japan.
1. Further localization
Language localization is the basic but not the only localization. Content and services also need to be localized, meeting local needs based on such things as manners and customs, job market, and work environment.
Such possible examples include content and services collaborating with “Hello Work”, the employment bureau initiated and managed by the Japanese government. This is a nationwide network of offices where people without jobs go and seek support in finding a job. The staff members consult and make utmost efforts to introduce a suitable job opportunity.
This might be what non-Japanese companies operating in Japan that post job opportunities in LinkedIn (and executive search agencies) would not like. However, Hello Work cannot be neglected in any discussions and/or initiatives in Japan’s job market, and the author feels that the job seekers who gain support from Hello Work and who leverage executive search firms are of different segments in the job market so both Hello Work and non-Japanese companies operating in Japan could co-exist.
2. Mobility of human resources
One primary characteristics of Japan’s job market is little mobility and limited people seeking job opportunities after they have joined a company. This mostly attributes to lifetime employment system, one of the main characteristics of traditional companies in Japan along with seniority system.
Under such systems, job hopping used to be extremely rare in Japan and for example even the author, who currently works for her second employer, never thought of changing her employer/career when she joined her first employer, a typical Japanese company that represents Japanese consumer electronics industry, in 1990s. It was the burst of the bubble economy around 1993 that such systems started to collapse to trigger growth of career-change market in Japan. This was further driven by some examples of success people working in non-Japanese companies operating in Japan who once started their career in Japanese traditional companies.
Having said that, career change is still the minority in Japan and mobility of human resources is still limited and therefore changing this situation is another critical requirement for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan. This is because one of the main uses of LinkedIn is discovering target human resources and opportunities, and first and upmost of such use is in recruiting. Of course, others include job seeking and finding business partners.
The author would like to add that although human resource mobility is still far behind in Japan, there are quite a few Japanese people working for Japanese companies who work globally and at least for such people LinkedIn could be an optimum online community for business networking.
3. More Japanese companies leverage social media in business
In general, work environment in many Japanese traditional companies does not encourage using social media compared to many western companies so changing this is another requirement for LinkedIn to become popular.
As mentioned in the previous article Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS, 2011 is the first era of SNS (social media) in Japan so first Japanese companies need to start leveraging social media in their business.
It is only as recent as this year that some innovative Japanese companies such as Honda started leveraging Facebook in recruiting new graduates, as introduced in the previous article Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan. Also it is only from 2010 that some companies such as Fast Retailing (famous for UniQlo brand) started leveraging Facebook in their marketing.
Such companies are still minority in Japan, and even such companies still have not started using LinkedIn. Such companies first need to start using LinkedIn as innovators in this realm and more Japanese companies need to start leveraging social media in business.
4. Change in mindset of companies and individuals
#2 and #3 mentioned above cannot be fulfilled unless companies and individuals change their mindset.
They would need to be fully aware the power and benefit of effective use of social media. Companies need to set rules regarding privacy and use of social media and in work environment with such rules companies need to be comfortable disclosing their information online and be open to potential employees, business partners and customers.
And in the same work environment, individuals also need to be comfortable disclosing their information (work experience, education etc.) while securing their company information. This means individuals moving out from general preference of anonymity, which is critical in being a member of an online community of professionals.
What encourages companies and individuals change their mindset include introducing successful case studies. This could be of western countries but those of Japanese companies are far more convincing in Japan where lock-step mentality strongly prevails. Also, similarly to how (traditional) media played an important role making Facebook and Twitter to outbreak, exposure to (traditional) media is extremely effective in attracting awareness of the majority of the Japanese.
5. The author’s final thoughts
It is not only about LinkedIn that are the main possible requirements for LinkedIn to become popular in Japan and for that reason it is likely to take time and much efforts for LinkedIn to take root in Japan. The author feels that the change in the mindset of the companies and individuals is the biggest factor.
When localization in all aspects is complete, the key would be “promotions”. This requires LinkedIn evangelists, who are to strategically plan and implement such promotions similarly to any other marketing communication strategy. In doing so, benefits and points that differentiates LinkedIn from other social media for business use needs to be delivered.
Last but not least, social media is a tool or means to achieve something and LinkedIn is of effective business and marketing and to the author LinkedIn provides the best solution to solve business issues. For this reason, if the author were one of the evangelists, she would stress such things in core message and introduce ROI and outcome of leveraging LinkedIn when introducing successful cases.
Resources:-
After an office was set up in Tokyo in May, LinkedIn officially announced on October 20 that they will start providing Japanese version and to enter Japan market. Language localization is one but not only requirements for LinkedIn to become popular. Other possible requirements include localization of content and services, mobilization of human resources in job market and more Japanese companies leveraging social media, all of which require change in mindset of the companies and the individuals.
Saturday, 1 October 2011
Vol.68 – Social New Graduate Recruiting to Take Root in Japan?
The previous article Vol.51 – How Internet and Social Media is Changing Recruiting in Japan mentioned that a few Japanese companies started to leverage social media in their recruiting. And now from recent articles it is prominent that more companies are to start leveraging social media, primarily Facebook, in recruiting new graduates.
1. What is the background of more companies implementing social media in recruiting new graduates in Japan?
It is the difference in the environment of recruiting new graduates this year from previous years.
1) New rule of recruiting set by Japan Federation of Economic Organizations
In previous years companies could start recruiting new graduates who are to join them 18 months ahead, such as accepting applications and holding seminars introducing their company and opportunities from October 1. However, Japan Federation of Economic Organizations reviewed their Ethics Charter and set the rule that allow companies to start such recruiting activities after December 1 from this year.
Such review was made because companies have been moving up their recruiting schedule; 20 years ago they would start recruiting new graduates who are to join the company 10 – 12 months ahead. This usually means longer time for students forced to be engaged in job hunting, sacrificing studying.
The new rule allows companies to communicate to the general public. What the companies cannot do is open recruiting website/web pages targeting new graduates who are to start working from April 2013, hold recruiting seminars, and obtaining personal information for recruiting.
2) Social media becoming popular in Japan
As in previous articles such as Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS social media such as Facebook and Twitter truly started to become popular this year. In such a situation, some innovative Japanese companies have been opening up their Facebook pages and starting to leverage social media in recruiting, as explained in previous articles including Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan.
2. How some leaders in recruiting industry in Japan are to adapt to the new rule?
They plan to adapt to the new rule by communicating to the general public new graduates. They plan to do so by hosting seminars with the objectives of motivating new graduates for job hunting. They also plan to leverage the Internet to achieve the same objective.
Similarly to companies, companies in recruiting industry also need to postpone opening website for new graduates who are to start working from April 2013 from October to December; therefore, they plan to enrich online information services regarding job hunting. For example, they plan to post movies free of charge to provide information regarding industry trends to the general public new graduates.
3. How are companies likely to communicate to the general public new graduates?
They most likely to leverage Facebook from October to communicate to the general public new graduates.
A HRM and recruiting consultant established a new company in September with the objective of supporting companies who would like to leverage Facebook in their social recruiting. As of September 29, 25 companies asked him to support their social recruiting. For this reason, the consultant assumed that many Japanese companies are to start opening up their Facebook Pages on October 1, which seems to be quite true.
4. Why Facebook Page is ideal in adapting to the new rule?
It is because Facebook users are asked to make registration using their real name. This means that unlike providing information on their website, companies will be able to analyze and understand what kind of new graduates have been accessing their Facebook Pages even if they do not collect personal information.
In addition, if managed appropriately, new graduates are likely to share information they find on Facebook Pages about the company, employees and what it is like working in the company, which is beneficial for companies managing Facebook Pages.
5. The author’s final thoughts
Both the companies and the new graduates would need to take actions immediately from December and for both of them October and November will an important phase, preparing and planning phase for official recruiting and job hunting from December 1. The success in recruiting and job hunting would attribute to strategic use of the Internet, especially social media, in October and November. This means increase in importance and necessity in social literacy.
Optimization of social media use leads optimization and efficiency in recruiting and job hunting. The companies would better understand their audience thus they would know who to target in recruiting. And new graduates would be able to better understand the company and their culture beforehand meaning minimization of mismatch.
Resources:-
A new rule of new graduate recruiting attributing to changes in environment is likely to drive social recruiting in Japan at last. The prominent trend is likely to be companies start opening up Facebook Pages from October 1. From this year, the success in recruiting and job hunting would attribute to strategic use of the Internet, especially social media, in October and November. This means importance and necessity in social literacy. Optimization of social media use leads optimization and efficiency in recruiting and job hunting. The companies would better understand their audience thus they would know who to target in recruiting. And new graduates would be able to better understand the company and their culture beforehand meaning minimization of mismatch.
1. What is the background of more companies implementing social media in recruiting new graduates in Japan?
It is the difference in the environment of recruiting new graduates this year from previous years.
1) New rule of recruiting set by Japan Federation of Economic Organizations
In previous years companies could start recruiting new graduates who are to join them 18 months ahead, such as accepting applications and holding seminars introducing their company and opportunities from October 1. However, Japan Federation of Economic Organizations reviewed their Ethics Charter and set the rule that allow companies to start such recruiting activities after December 1 from this year.
Such review was made because companies have been moving up their recruiting schedule; 20 years ago they would start recruiting new graduates who are to join the company 10 – 12 months ahead. This usually means longer time for students forced to be engaged in job hunting, sacrificing studying.
The new rule allows companies to communicate to the general public. What the companies cannot do is open recruiting website/web pages targeting new graduates who are to start working from April 2013, hold recruiting seminars, and obtaining personal information for recruiting.
2) Social media becoming popular in Japan
As in previous articles such as Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS social media such as Facebook and Twitter truly started to become popular this year. In such a situation, some innovative Japanese companies have been opening up their Facebook pages and starting to leverage social media in recruiting, as explained in previous articles including Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan.
2. How some leaders in recruiting industry in Japan are to adapt to the new rule?
They plan to adapt to the new rule by communicating to the general public new graduates. They plan to do so by hosting seminars with the objectives of motivating new graduates for job hunting. They also plan to leverage the Internet to achieve the same objective.
Similarly to companies, companies in recruiting industry also need to postpone opening website for new graduates who are to start working from April 2013 from October to December; therefore, they plan to enrich online information services regarding job hunting. For example, they plan to post movies free of charge to provide information regarding industry trends to the general public new graduates.
3. How are companies likely to communicate to the general public new graduates?
They most likely to leverage Facebook from October to communicate to the general public new graduates.
A HRM and recruiting consultant established a new company in September with the objective of supporting companies who would like to leverage Facebook in their social recruiting. As of September 29, 25 companies asked him to support their social recruiting. For this reason, the consultant assumed that many Japanese companies are to start opening up their Facebook Pages on October 1, which seems to be quite true.
4. Why Facebook Page is ideal in adapting to the new rule?
It is because Facebook users are asked to make registration using their real name. This means that unlike providing information on their website, companies will be able to analyze and understand what kind of new graduates have been accessing their Facebook Pages even if they do not collect personal information.
In addition, if managed appropriately, new graduates are likely to share information they find on Facebook Pages about the company, employees and what it is like working in the company, which is beneficial for companies managing Facebook Pages.
5. The author’s final thoughts
Both the companies and the new graduates would need to take actions immediately from December and for both of them October and November will an important phase, preparing and planning phase for official recruiting and job hunting from December 1. The success in recruiting and job hunting would attribute to strategic use of the Internet, especially social media, in October and November. This means increase in importance and necessity in social literacy.
Optimization of social media use leads optimization and efficiency in recruiting and job hunting. The companies would better understand their audience thus they would know who to target in recruiting. And new graduates would be able to better understand the company and their culture beforehand meaning minimization of mismatch.
Resources:-
A new rule of new graduate recruiting attributing to changes in environment is likely to drive social recruiting in Japan at last. The prominent trend is likely to be companies start opening up Facebook Pages from October 1. From this year, the success in recruiting and job hunting would attribute to strategic use of the Internet, especially social media, in October and November. This means importance and necessity in social literacy. Optimization of social media use leads optimization and efficiency in recruiting and job hunting. The companies would better understand their audience thus they would know who to target in recruiting. And new graduates would be able to better understand the company and their culture beforehand meaning minimization of mismatch.
Sunday, 18 September 2011
Vol.67 – KFS of Web Contribution to Information Value, Branding and Engagement
To conclude series of articles on Web Equity survey implemented by Japan Brand Strategy following the previous articles Vol.65 – Web Equity Valuation in Japan – Model and Ranking and Vol.66 – KFS of Web Contribution to Sales Generation and Value, the author would like to introduce what kind of corporate websites are ranked high in “Information Value”, one of the two constituents of Web Equity, together with possible KFS (key factors for success) for high “Information Value” in this article.
1. What is “Information Value”? How is it calculated?
“Information Value” is how much the website contributed to corporate branding. This requires customer acquisition (driving web users to the website), retention (making visitors re-visit frequently) and engagement (interacting with online customers to develop long-term relationship).
In calculating Information Value, “Access Value” and “Behaviour Value” were calculated and then added together.
(1) Access Value
Access Value is how much the online customer’s access to view the web site information contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
This was calculated by multiplying PV (Page View) = number of pages of web sites viewed by value coefficient (unit value of a page set).
(2) Behaviour Value
Behaviour Value is how much online customer’s behaviour other than viewing pages such as applying for a campaign and requesting for pamphlets contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
Number of behaviours such as membership registration and reading e-newsletters were selected.
Then for each behaviour, number of people who took such behaviour was calculated which was multiplied by value coefficient (unit value of a behaviour).
2. Which company websites are ranked high up in Information Value ranking?
They are mostly companies of frequent purchase such as beverage, transportation/leisure and financial services such as the following.
Unit: Million Yen
Information Value / Web Equity / Company/Brand / Information Value / Access Value / Behaviour Value
1 / 7 / Suntory / 29,090 / 19,783 / 9,306
2 / 10 / UniQlo / 25,106 / 21,134 / 3,973
3 / 17 / Kirin (Beverage) / 21,174 / 11,138 / 10,036
4 / 18 / Asahi (Beverage) / 20,027 / 10,409 / 9,618
5 / 4 / NTT DoCoMo / 19,612 / 14,541 / 5,071
6 / 30 / JP Bank / 19,500 / 16,543 / 2,958
7 / 1 / All Nippon Airways / 18,185 / 13,948 / 4,236
8 / 19 / JP Network / 18,119 / 16,860 / 1,259
9 / 2 / Panasonic / 17,567 / 6,905 / 10,662
10 / 14 Tokyo Disney Resort / 16,814 / 15,040 / 1,774
Information Value can be regarded as a leading indicator of sales because increase in awareness and interest of consumers is likely to lead to increase in sales; therefore, Information Value trend can be said as an index that investors are recommended to be aware of.
3. What are some possible KFS for high Information Value?
1) Strategic use of multiple online media
Strategically leveraging multiple online media increases touch points of web users therefore it increases possibility of driving web users to the website.
In the case of Suntory, which was ranked #1 for 3 consecutive years, one reason for high Information Value is many e-newsletter subscribers and people applying to campaigns, driving web users to the website.
The company also has been successful in developing relationship with online consumers through multiple online media including blogs, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
2) Continuous update of content meeting customer needs
Web visitors visit website for content (information) and they would re-visit if they are satisfied with the quality and quantity of the content and even recommend to others, meaning increasing loyalty to the website. Thus, this approach consequently leads to creating fans of the website, the company and products/services.
By no means, this approach means increase in access to the website. Also, regular and frequent information update is appropriate for SEO along with optimum key words and phrases.
It is for this reason that many food companies have developed recipe content, which is accessed daily by web users. Entertainment contents such as gaming and beneficial information such as campaign related contents are also content accessed very frequently.
Communication site creating online community is another content that is visited frequently by web users. A good example is UniQlo’s UNIQLOOKS. Web users around the globe can post and share photos of people or themselves in UniQlo fashion (wearing UniQlo clothes). Web users will be able to know popular fashion at a glance and purchase any items they like online.
3) Proactive roll out of mobile website/content
Proactive roll out of mobile website/content creating environment in which web users can access online contents from multiple mobile terminals such as smart phones and tablets when mobiles are drastically becoming popular is also a good approach to drive as many web users to the website.
There have been many companies rolling out websites for mobile phones but lately their challenge has shifted to rolling out contents for smart phones.
For example, in the case of mobile website of SoftBank, types of mobile terminals of the web users accessing the mobile website is automatically determined. Then the optimum display is selected for that particular web user and displayed. The mobile website is not optimized in terms of the display size but also designed to enhance usability such as menu easily operated by touch panels of standard smart phones.
A good approach to encourage web users to benefit from mobile website is providing them with mobile application of frequently used services. Many airplane companies provide application for smart phones free of charge. This enables web users making reservation anytime, anywhere with ease, leading to frequent use of their services.
4. What is the case of Information Value #1 website?
1) Overview of Suntory website initiative
Suntory is ranked #1 for Information Value for 3 consecutive years. The company has been developing variety of contents for the website. And lately the company has been focusing on leveraging social media to increase touch point with online customers.
Their upcoming challenge is rolling out mobile website, adapting each page to smart phones.
2) Examples of online initiatives
(1) Branding contents
Branding contents include TV commercial of products and collection of movies/web casts of the company called Suntory Channel.
There is also Suntory Café Plus in which information to help web users enjoy their life such as about party, gift and cuisine are uploaded together with introduction of related products.
(2) Mixi
Mixi is the leading SNS in Japan. In November 2010, the company opened a Mixi app specific to Suntory including gaming introducing their products and online community to encourage interaction among web users.
(3) Facebook
The company also opened their official Facebook Page this June. A few posts are made every day aligning with official company blog and website.
The team members managing the Facebook Page had prepared to the opening of the Page since summer 2010 by using Facebook privately and studying official Facebook Pages of other companies. One of the outputs of such preparation is knowhow of posting in friendly style and manner.
5. The author’s final thoughts
The above possible KFS are mostly the same as those of Sales Value mentioned in the previous article. After all, these together with globalization, are the focuses and challenges of the Japanese companies in enhancing their online branding and Web Equity, engagement with (online) customers, leading to sales/revenue generation.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
Japanese company websites of high Information Value are mostly of companies with products purchased frequently on a daily bases. Some possible KFS for high Information Value include strategic use of multiple online media, continuous update of content meeting customer needs and proactive roll out of mobile website/content. These KFS are mostly the same as those of Sales Value, and lead to customer loyalty and engagement and branding.
1. What is “Information Value”? How is it calculated?
“Information Value” is how much the website contributed to corporate branding. This requires customer acquisition (driving web users to the website), retention (making visitors re-visit frequently) and engagement (interacting with online customers to develop long-term relationship).
In calculating Information Value, “Access Value” and “Behaviour Value” were calculated and then added together.
(1) Access Value
Access Value is how much the online customer’s access to view the web site information contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
This was calculated by multiplying PV (Page View) = number of pages of web sites viewed by value coefficient (unit value of a page set).
(2) Behaviour Value
Behaviour Value is how much online customer’s behaviour other than viewing pages such as applying for a campaign and requesting for pamphlets contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
Number of behaviours such as membership registration and reading e-newsletters were selected.
Then for each behaviour, number of people who took such behaviour was calculated which was multiplied by value coefficient (unit value of a behaviour).
2. Which company websites are ranked high up in Information Value ranking?
They are mostly companies of frequent purchase such as beverage, transportation/leisure and financial services such as the following.
Unit: Million Yen
Information Value / Web Equity / Company/Brand / Information Value / Access Value / Behaviour Value
1 / 7 / Suntory / 29,090 / 19,783 / 9,306
2 / 10 / UniQlo / 25,106 / 21,134 / 3,973
3 / 17 / Kirin (Beverage) / 21,174 / 11,138 / 10,036
4 / 18 / Asahi (Beverage) / 20,027 / 10,409 / 9,618
5 / 4 / NTT DoCoMo / 19,612 / 14,541 / 5,071
6 / 30 / JP Bank / 19,500 / 16,543 / 2,958
7 / 1 / All Nippon Airways / 18,185 / 13,948 / 4,236
8 / 19 / JP Network / 18,119 / 16,860 / 1,259
9 / 2 / Panasonic / 17,567 / 6,905 / 10,662
10 / 14 Tokyo Disney Resort / 16,814 / 15,040 / 1,774
Information Value can be regarded as a leading indicator of sales because increase in awareness and interest of consumers is likely to lead to increase in sales; therefore, Information Value trend can be said as an index that investors are recommended to be aware of.
3. What are some possible KFS for high Information Value?
1) Strategic use of multiple online media
Strategically leveraging multiple online media increases touch points of web users therefore it increases possibility of driving web users to the website.
In the case of Suntory, which was ranked #1 for 3 consecutive years, one reason for high Information Value is many e-newsletter subscribers and people applying to campaigns, driving web users to the website.
The company also has been successful in developing relationship with online consumers through multiple online media including blogs, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
2) Continuous update of content meeting customer needs
Web visitors visit website for content (information) and they would re-visit if they are satisfied with the quality and quantity of the content and even recommend to others, meaning increasing loyalty to the website. Thus, this approach consequently leads to creating fans of the website, the company and products/services.
By no means, this approach means increase in access to the website. Also, regular and frequent information update is appropriate for SEO along with optimum key words and phrases.
It is for this reason that many food companies have developed recipe content, which is accessed daily by web users. Entertainment contents such as gaming and beneficial information such as campaign related contents are also content accessed very frequently.
Communication site creating online community is another content that is visited frequently by web users. A good example is UniQlo’s UNIQLOOKS. Web users around the globe can post and share photos of people or themselves in UniQlo fashion (wearing UniQlo clothes). Web users will be able to know popular fashion at a glance and purchase any items they like online.
3) Proactive roll out of mobile website/content
Proactive roll out of mobile website/content creating environment in which web users can access online contents from multiple mobile terminals such as smart phones and tablets when mobiles are drastically becoming popular is also a good approach to drive as many web users to the website.
There have been many companies rolling out websites for mobile phones but lately their challenge has shifted to rolling out contents for smart phones.
For example, in the case of mobile website of SoftBank, types of mobile terminals of the web users accessing the mobile website is automatically determined. Then the optimum display is selected for that particular web user and displayed. The mobile website is not optimized in terms of the display size but also designed to enhance usability such as menu easily operated by touch panels of standard smart phones.
A good approach to encourage web users to benefit from mobile website is providing them with mobile application of frequently used services. Many airplane companies provide application for smart phones free of charge. This enables web users making reservation anytime, anywhere with ease, leading to frequent use of their services.
4. What is the case of Information Value #1 website?
1) Overview of Suntory website initiative
Suntory is ranked #1 for Information Value for 3 consecutive years. The company has been developing variety of contents for the website. And lately the company has been focusing on leveraging social media to increase touch point with online customers.
Their upcoming challenge is rolling out mobile website, adapting each page to smart phones.
2) Examples of online initiatives
(1) Branding contents
Branding contents include TV commercial of products and collection of movies/web casts of the company called Suntory Channel.
There is also Suntory Café Plus in which information to help web users enjoy their life such as about party, gift and cuisine are uploaded together with introduction of related products.
(2) Mixi
Mixi is the leading SNS in Japan. In November 2010, the company opened a Mixi app specific to Suntory including gaming introducing their products and online community to encourage interaction among web users.
(3) Facebook
The company also opened their official Facebook Page this June. A few posts are made every day aligning with official company blog and website.
The team members managing the Facebook Page had prepared to the opening of the Page since summer 2010 by using Facebook privately and studying official Facebook Pages of other companies. One of the outputs of such preparation is knowhow of posting in friendly style and manner.
5. The author’s final thoughts
The above possible KFS are mostly the same as those of Sales Value mentioned in the previous article. After all, these together with globalization, are the focuses and challenges of the Japanese companies in enhancing their online branding and Web Equity, engagement with (online) customers, leading to sales/revenue generation.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
Japanese company websites of high Information Value are mostly of companies with products purchased frequently on a daily bases. Some possible KFS for high Information Value include strategic use of multiple online media, continuous update of content meeting customer needs and proactive roll out of mobile website/content. These KFS are mostly the same as those of Sales Value, and lead to customer loyalty and engagement and branding.
Saturday, 17 September 2011
Vol.66 – KFS of Web Contribution to Sales Generation and Value
The previous article Vol.65 – Web Equity Valuation in Japan – Model and Ranking outlined the Web Equity valuation model and the results of the ranking by Japan Brand Strategy based on a special article published in a recent Japanese business weekly magazine.
Based on the same article, the author would like to introduce what kind of corporate websites are raked high in “Sales Value”, one of the two constituents of Web Equity, together with possible 4 KFS (key factors for success) for high “Sales Value” in this article.
1. What is “Sales Value”? How is it calculated?
“Sales Value” is how much the website contributed to sales generation among variety of media and communication channels that consumers access and refer in purchasing products and services.
This is calculated through the following 4 steps.
(1) Calculate what percentage of customers who purchased products and/or services used web site in their decision making.
(2) Calculate the degree (what percentage) the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(3) Multiply (1) and (2) to calculate effect of web site = average amount of information the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(4) Multiply (3) and marginal profit to calculate Sales Value.
2. Which company websites are ranked high up in Sales Value ranking?
They are mostly large companies of strong brands as the following.
Sales Value Ranking / Web Equity Ranking/ Company/Brand / Sales Value (million yen)
1 / 1 All Nippon Airways / 89,692
2 / 2 / Panasonic / 70,769
3 / 3 / Toyota / 62,360
4 / 5 / Honda / 46,739
5 / 6 / Nissan / 44,670
6 / 4 / NTT / DoCoMo / 40,679
7 / 12 / Japan Railway Tokai / 40,086
8 / 13 / Nomura Securities / 38,816
9 / 6 / Japan Travel Bureau / 38,166
10 / 11 / Sony / 37,410
3. What are some possible KFS for high Sales Value?
1) Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC)
Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) in which strategically integrating all possible marketing communication tools and media, offline and offline, contributes to high Sales Value because it increases touch points with the customers.
In general, IMC is advanced in western countries, the U.S. in particular such as Fedex．On the other hand, Japan is far behind because departments in companies that are responsible for traditional offline media and the Internet are usually separated.
Many companies ranked high up in Sales Value rankings are innovators in IMC in Japan.
2) Web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online
Web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online of products and services contribute to high Sales Value. This is because it is a good approach to make consumers feel and understand the benefit of the products and services.
All Nippon Airways web content in which online consumers share their experiences of travelling is a good example. This web content allows cabin attendants and travelers share guides, know-how and experiences of their trips/travels, which helps provoke demand of travelling.
The next good example of virtual experience web content is Panasonic’s LED content. This allows consumers to find places in their homes where they can replace current lights with LED and make simulation of energy saving. The result of the simulation can be posted on Twitter and Facebook to share with online friends.
Another good example is Nissan’s content called User Voice in which experiences of Nissan car owners is shared. Voices and information can be displayed by types of cars. Voices and information can also be carefully selected by setting requirements such as gender, age, number of car users and usage with a search function.
3) Proactive use of social media
Proactive use of social media also contributes to high Sales Value ranking because it promotes web users share information.
Companies such as All Nippon Airways (ANA) have been leveraging SNS. Companies such as ANA and Nissan already have started leveraging Facebook.
UniQlo is the company that is often mentioned as innovator in leveraging Facebook in Japan. It is ranked 20 in Sales Value ranking which is unexpected to the author who thought it would be higher up in the ranking; however, considering the business size with top 10 companies, it can be said that UniQlo’s website is highly contributing to generating sales.
4. What is the case of Sales Value #1 website?
1) Overview of All Nippon Airways (ANA) website
All Nippon Airways (ANA) is ranked #1 for Sales Value and Web Equity. Its Web Equity is 107,877 million yen with Sales Value of 89,692 million yen and Information Value of 18,185 million yen.
The company has successfully developed its website as an important sales channel. Its website now generates sales of approximately 400 billion yen per year with its 70% of its air flight business generated online.
2) Online initiatives
The next challenge for ANA is strengthening online communication leveraging the Internet. The following are some of the ongoing initiatives to achieve such objective.
(1) Facebook Page
The company opened its official Facebook Page this January. Information and photos of cabin attendants, trips and events unique to ANA are posted one after another. People who clicked “Like it!” totaled over 170,000 as of middle of August.
Immediate after the March 11 Japan disaster, considering victims, information related to the Japan disaster was posted such as information of relief services to Tohoku, re-opening of Sendai Airport and raising money for victims leveraging frequent flyer programme.
(2) SNS content
SNS called Social Sky Park opened in June targeting members of ANA Frequent Flyer Club. When members post on Twitter and Facebook regarding varieties of proposed topics, the post is also shared on the SNS. The content is of user generation which is encouraged to be easily shared online.
(3) Globalization
ANA started globalization of their web initiative to provoke demand of overseas market. The company first rolled its website in multiple languages and currencies to allow worldwide customer making reservation and payments online.
However, ANA’s awareness and brand is still rather low overseas. Therefore, the company’s next challenge is raising its awareness and brand overseas leveraging such media as Facebook.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
Japanese company websites of high Sales Value are mostly of large companies with strong brand. Some possible KFS for high Sales Value include Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC), web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online, and proactive use of social media such as Facebook Page, Twitter and SNS. Globalization is also a challenge for many companies.
Based on the same article, the author would like to introduce what kind of corporate websites are raked high in “Sales Value”, one of the two constituents of Web Equity, together with possible 4 KFS (key factors for success) for high “Sales Value” in this article.
1. What is “Sales Value”? How is it calculated?
“Sales Value” is how much the website contributed to sales generation among variety of media and communication channels that consumers access and refer in purchasing products and services.
This is calculated through the following 4 steps.
(1) Calculate what percentage of customers who purchased products and/or services used web site in their decision making.
(2) Calculate the degree (what percentage) the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(3) Multiply (1) and (2) to calculate effect of web site = average amount of information the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(4) Multiply (3) and marginal profit to calculate Sales Value.
2. Which company websites are ranked high up in Sales Value ranking?
They are mostly large companies of strong brands as the following.
Sales Value Ranking / Web Equity Ranking/ Company/Brand / Sales Value (million yen)
1 / 1 All Nippon Airways / 89,692
2 / 2 / Panasonic / 70,769
3 / 3 / Toyota / 62,360
4 / 5 / Honda / 46,739
5 / 6 / Nissan / 44,670
6 / 4 / NTT / DoCoMo / 40,679
7 / 12 / Japan Railway Tokai / 40,086
8 / 13 / Nomura Securities / 38,816
9 / 6 / Japan Travel Bureau / 38,166
10 / 11 / Sony / 37,410
3. What are some possible KFS for high Sales Value?
1) Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC)
Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) in which strategically integrating all possible marketing communication tools and media, offline and offline, contributes to high Sales Value because it increases touch points with the customers.
In general, IMC is advanced in western countries, the U.S. in particular such as Fedex．On the other hand, Japan is far behind because departments in companies that are responsible for traditional offline media and the Internet are usually separated.
Many companies ranked high up in Sales Value rankings are innovators in IMC in Japan.
2) Web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online
Web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online of products and services contribute to high Sales Value. This is because it is a good approach to make consumers feel and understand the benefit of the products and services.
All Nippon Airways web content in which online consumers share their experiences of travelling is a good example. This web content allows cabin attendants and travelers share guides, know-how and experiences of their trips/travels, which helps provoke demand of travelling.
The next good example of virtual experience web content is Panasonic’s LED content. This allows consumers to find places in their homes where they can replace current lights with LED and make simulation of energy saving. The result of the simulation can be posted on Twitter and Facebook to share with online friends.
Another good example is Nissan’s content called User Voice in which experiences of Nissan car owners is shared. Voices and information can be displayed by types of cars. Voices and information can also be carefully selected by setting requirements such as gender, age, number of car users and usage with a search function.
3) Proactive use of social media
Proactive use of social media also contributes to high Sales Value ranking because it promotes web users share information.
Companies such as All Nippon Airways (ANA) have been leveraging SNS. Companies such as ANA and Nissan already have started leveraging Facebook.
UniQlo is the company that is often mentioned as innovator in leveraging Facebook in Japan. It is ranked 20 in Sales Value ranking which is unexpected to the author who thought it would be higher up in the ranking; however, considering the business size with top 10 companies, it can be said that UniQlo’s website is highly contributing to generating sales.
4. What is the case of Sales Value #1 website?
1) Overview of All Nippon Airways (ANA) website
All Nippon Airways (ANA) is ranked #1 for Sales Value and Web Equity. Its Web Equity is 107,877 million yen with Sales Value of 89,692 million yen and Information Value of 18,185 million yen.
The company has successfully developed its website as an important sales channel. Its website now generates sales of approximately 400 billion yen per year with its 70% of its air flight business generated online.
2) Online initiatives
The next challenge for ANA is strengthening online communication leveraging the Internet. The following are some of the ongoing initiatives to achieve such objective.
(1) Facebook Page
The company opened its official Facebook Page this January. Information and photos of cabin attendants, trips and events unique to ANA are posted one after another. People who clicked “Like it!” totaled over 170,000 as of middle of August.
Immediate after the March 11 Japan disaster, considering victims, information related to the Japan disaster was posted such as information of relief services to Tohoku, re-opening of Sendai Airport and raising money for victims leveraging frequent flyer programme.
(2) SNS content
SNS called Social Sky Park opened in June targeting members of ANA Frequent Flyer Club. When members post on Twitter and Facebook regarding varieties of proposed topics, the post is also shared on the SNS. The content is of user generation which is encouraged to be easily shared online.
(3) Globalization
ANA started globalization of their web initiative to provoke demand of overseas market. The company first rolled its website in multiple languages and currencies to allow worldwide customer making reservation and payments online.
However, ANA’s awareness and brand is still rather low overseas. Therefore, the company’s next challenge is raising its awareness and brand overseas leveraging such media as Facebook.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
Japanese company websites of high Sales Value are mostly of large companies with strong brand. Some possible KFS for high Sales Value include Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC), web contents with which consumers can enjoy virtual experience online, and proactive use of social media such as Facebook Page, Twitter and SNS. Globalization is also a challenge for many companies.
Sunday, 4 September 2011
Vol.65 – Web Equity Valuation in Japan – Model and Ranking
Web Equity Ranking of companies in Japan was introduced in a special article published in a recent Japanese business weekly magazine.
The author would like to outline the Web Equity valuation model and the results of the ranking based on the article.
1. What is the background of the Web Equity Valuation efforts in Japan?
It is the fact that the value of Internet as a communication channel and advertising together with its degree of influence are increasing in Japan just like in western countries.
For example, according to the survey result on advertising expenditure in Japan implemented by Dentsu, the leading advertising agency in Japan, advertising expenditure of the 4 traditional media (TV, newspaper, radio and magazine) for 2010 was decrease by 1.9% from 2009 when it was increase by 9.6% for the online advertising.
This means greater needs of means to know ROI of the Internet and website from companies leveraging the Internet and websites in their business, marketing and communication.
Therefore, a leading branding consultancy in Japan called Japan Brand Strategy developed a model of Web Equity Valuation for BtoC companies and started to publish the ranking after valuating 200+ web sites of around 2004.
2. What is the overview of the valuation?
1) Scope
Valuation of how much a corporate web site of BtoC companies contributed to the business in a year (April 2010 – March 2011) was calculated. Web sites of BtoB companies were excluded from the valuation.
2) Which corporate web sites
BtoC businesses were classified to 12 industries; electronics/machinery, IT/telecommunications, automobile/automotive, housing, entertainment/hobby related, foods and beverages, transport and leisure, retailers, finance and securities, energy and materials, toiletries and OTC drugs, and pharmaceutical.
And total of 236 leading corporate web sites were selected from each industry.
3) Data used
Data such as the following of each company was used in valuation.
- Financial data ending March 2011: if end of fiscal year is different, latest financial data was used.
- Result of online survey: implemented in July 2011, with 18,600 response
3. How valuation of Web Equity of each corporate web site performed?
“Sales Value” and “Information Value” of each corporate web site were calculated then the two were added together, as the Web Equity of the corporate web site.
Web Equity = Sales Value + Information Value
1) Sales Value
Sales Value is valuation of how much the web site contributed to selling of the company’s products and services.
This was calculated through the following 4 steps.
(1) Calculate what percentage of customers who purchased products and/or services used web site in their decision making.
(2) Calculate the degree (what percentage) the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(3) Multiply (1) and (2) to calculate effect of web site = average amount of information the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(4) Multiply (3) and marginal profit to calculate Sales Value.
2) Information Value
Information Value is how much the corporate web site contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
“Access Value” and “Behaviour Value” were calculated and then added together to calculate Information Value,
(1) Access Value
Access Value is how much the online customer’s access to view the web site information contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
This was calculated by multiplying PV (Page View) = number of pages of web sites viewed by value coefficient (unit value of a page set).
(2) Behaviour Value
Behaviour Value is how much online customer’s behaviour other than viewing pages such as applying for a campaign and requesting for pamphlets contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
Number of behaviours such as membership registration and reading e-newsletters were selected.
Then for each behaviour, number of people who took such behaviour was calculated which was multiplied by value coefficient (unit value of a behaviour).
4. What was the result?
The top 10 companies were the following.
2011 / 2010 / Company/Brand / Web Equity (million yen)
1 / 4 / All Nippon Airways / 107,877
2 / 1 / Panasonic / 88,337
3 / 5 / Toyota / 72,337
4 / 3 / NTT DoCoMo / 60,291
5 / 2 / Honda / 56,960
6 / 24 / Nissan / 52,513
7 / 10 / Suntory / 51,787
8 / 6 / Japan Travel Bureau / 48,008
9 / 9 / Japan Airlines / 47,913
10 / 12 / UniQlo / 45,728
To the author, the companies/brands that were ranked in top 50 all in at least one of the following:-
(1) Strong corporate brand: e.g. Panasonic, Toyota, Sony, Honda, Nissan, Nomura Securities
(2) Strong product brand: e.g. NTT DoCoMo, Suntory, Kirin, Asahi, Coca Cola Japan, UniQlo
(3) Active in EC (Electronic Commerce): e.g. All Nippon Airways, Japan Travel Bureau, Japan Airlines, Japan Railways
(4) Leveraging SNS in their communication: e.g. Honda, UniQlo, All Nippon Airways, Suntory
(5) Leveraging Mobile: e.g. NTT DoCoMo, SoftBank Mobile, Tokyo Disney Resort
5. The author’s final thoughts
The Web Equity valuation model of Japan Brand Strategy may not be sufficiently refined from corporate finance perspective. It is nothing like corporate valuation model (of NPV = Net Present Value and DCF = Discounted Cash Flow) or of brand valuation of InterBrand.
Also, only BtoC company web sites are valuated. Many BtoB companies also leverage their web sites in their business and they cannot be disregarded.
Having said that, the result of the valuation and the ranking does provide us with some insights that help us coming up with clues what are required to enhance value of the web sites.
In one of her upcoming article the author would like to introduce some of the initiatives of the top ranking web sites that is assumed to made them to be of top ranking.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
A Japanese Brand Strategy Consultancy developed a Web Equity valuation model from which it calculated value of corporate web sites of major BtoC companies. Although the valuation is not necessarily refined as corporate and brand valuation model, it does provide us with some insights and help us understand what is required to enhance web equity.
The author would like to outline the Web Equity valuation model and the results of the ranking based on the article.
1. What is the background of the Web Equity Valuation efforts in Japan?
It is the fact that the value of Internet as a communication channel and advertising together with its degree of influence are increasing in Japan just like in western countries.
For example, according to the survey result on advertising expenditure in Japan implemented by Dentsu, the leading advertising agency in Japan, advertising expenditure of the 4 traditional media (TV, newspaper, radio and magazine) for 2010 was decrease by 1.9% from 2009 when it was increase by 9.6% for the online advertising.
This means greater needs of means to know ROI of the Internet and website from companies leveraging the Internet and websites in their business, marketing and communication.
Therefore, a leading branding consultancy in Japan called Japan Brand Strategy developed a model of Web Equity Valuation for BtoC companies and started to publish the ranking after valuating 200+ web sites of around 2004.
2. What is the overview of the valuation?
1) Scope
Valuation of how much a corporate web site of BtoC companies contributed to the business in a year (April 2010 – March 2011) was calculated. Web sites of BtoB companies were excluded from the valuation.
2) Which corporate web sites
BtoC businesses were classified to 12 industries; electronics/machinery, IT/telecommunications, automobile/automotive, housing, entertainment/hobby related, foods and beverages, transport and leisure, retailers, finance and securities, energy and materials, toiletries and OTC drugs, and pharmaceutical.
And total of 236 leading corporate web sites were selected from each industry.
3) Data used
Data such as the following of each company was used in valuation.
- Financial data ending March 2011: if end of fiscal year is different, latest financial data was used.
- Result of online survey: implemented in July 2011, with 18,600 response
3. How valuation of Web Equity of each corporate web site performed?
“Sales Value” and “Information Value” of each corporate web site were calculated then the two were added together, as the Web Equity of the corporate web site.
Web Equity = Sales Value + Information Value
1) Sales Value
Sales Value is valuation of how much the web site contributed to selling of the company’s products and services.
This was calculated through the following 4 steps.
(1) Calculate what percentage of customers who purchased products and/or services used web site in their decision making.
(2) Calculate the degree (what percentage) the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(3) Multiply (1) and (2) to calculate effect of web site = average amount of information the purchaser used the web site in their decision making.
(4) Multiply (3) and marginal profit to calculate Sales Value.
2) Information Value
Information Value is how much the corporate web site contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
“Access Value” and “Behaviour Value” were calculated and then added together to calculate Information Value,
(1) Access Value
Access Value is how much the online customer’s access to view the web site information contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
This was calculated by multiplying PV (Page View) = number of pages of web sites viewed by value coefficient (unit value of a page set).
(2) Behaviour Value
Behaviour Value is how much online customer’s behaviour other than viewing pages such as applying for a campaign and requesting for pamphlets contributed to brand enhancement of the company and its products/services.
Number of behaviours such as membership registration and reading e-newsletters were selected.
Then for each behaviour, number of people who took such behaviour was calculated which was multiplied by value coefficient (unit value of a behaviour).
4. What was the result?
The top 10 companies were the following.
2011 / 2010 / Company/Brand / Web Equity (million yen)
1 / 4 / All Nippon Airways / 107,877
2 / 1 / Panasonic / 88,337
3 / 5 / Toyota / 72,337
4 / 3 / NTT DoCoMo / 60,291
5 / 2 / Honda / 56,960
6 / 24 / Nissan / 52,513
7 / 10 / Suntory / 51,787
8 / 6 / Japan Travel Bureau / 48,008
9 / 9 / Japan Airlines / 47,913
10 / 12 / UniQlo / 45,728
To the author, the companies/brands that were ranked in top 50 all in at least one of the following:-
(1) Strong corporate brand: e.g. Panasonic, Toyota, Sony, Honda, Nissan, Nomura Securities
(2) Strong product brand: e.g. NTT DoCoMo, Suntory, Kirin, Asahi, Coca Cola Japan, UniQlo
(3) Active in EC (Electronic Commerce): e.g. All Nippon Airways, Japan Travel Bureau, Japan Airlines, Japan Railways
(4) Leveraging SNS in their communication: e.g. Honda, UniQlo, All Nippon Airways, Suntory
(5) Leveraging Mobile: e.g. NTT DoCoMo, SoftBank Mobile, Tokyo Disney Resort
5. The author’s final thoughts
The Web Equity valuation model of Japan Brand Strategy may not be sufficiently refined from corporate finance perspective. It is nothing like corporate valuation model (of NPV = Net Present Value and DCF = Discounted Cash Flow) or of brand valuation of InterBrand.
Also, only BtoC company web sites are valuated. Many BtoB companies also leverage their web sites in their business and they cannot be disregarded.
Having said that, the result of the valuation and the ranking does provide us with some insights that help us coming up with clues what are required to enhance value of the web sites.
In one of her upcoming article the author would like to introduce some of the initiatives of the top ranking web sites that is assumed to made them to be of top ranking.
References:-
The web site of the weekly business magazine
http://dw.diamond.ne.jp/
Japan Brand Strategy - The web site of the brand strategy consultancy
http://japanbrand.jp/
Resources:-
A Japanese Brand Strategy Consultancy developed a Web Equity valuation model from which it calculated value of corporate web sites of major BtoC companies. Although the valuation is not necessarily refined as corporate and brand valuation model, it does provide us with some insights and help us understand what is required to enhance web equity.
Saturday, 20 August 2011
Vol.64 – Facebook and Twitter vs. LinkedIn and Google+ in Japan
Facebook and Twitter have started to become popular among early adaptors in Japan in the last one or two years but LinkedIn has not and Google Plus (Google+) is not yet used even among IT experts even if they have created their account.
In this article, the author would like to outline the popularity of the four social media in Japan.
1. How are the four social media popular in Japan?
Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn status has been explained in the previous articles from Vol.45 throughout Vol.47 when the author summarized the social media situation in Japan to conclude 2010 and predicted the trend for 2011, which turned out to be quite true as in Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS, which was based on a survey result about social media in Japan executed by a leading Japanese media.
In short, local leading SNS called Mixi and local blog called Ameba had been dominating Japan until the recent popularization of Twitter and Facebook. LinkedIn remains unpopular among the majority of the Japanese, so is Google Plus (Google+) which is still unpopular even among majority of online marketers.
2. How is Twitter?
Twitter was the first global social media that became hot in the summer of 2010, when it was featured in a special article in a leading Japanese business magazine together with introduction of applications and celebrities already using Twitter. Together with the localization (Japanese version) that was already available and the ease of use, Twitter immediately became hot among early adaptors including many popular politicians and companies/organizations as well as general public.
There were some online marketers who had been giving seminars about leveraging Twitter but few seemed to blog and/or write a book about it.
3. How is Facebook?
Facebook had mostly been used by bilingual Japanese mostly to be connected with friends outside Japan but Facebook outbreak came in January 2011 when the movie “Social Networking” started in Japan and Facebook was featured in mass media. This was when the author was convinced that “2011 will be the first year of SNS in Japan”.
Unlike Twitter, Facebook was immediately used by a few innovative companies in their marketing, which was featured in series of online articles of a leading Japanese business media. This together with the movie was the advantage the Facebook had over Twitter.
Now there are some online Japanese marketers who constantly blog and/or wrote a book about how to leverage Facebook in marketing. Also, people who first started using Twitter (online marketers in particular) tend to prefer Facebook
4. How about LinkedIn?
Japanese people living in Japan who are on LinkedIn are mostly in HR/recruiting and IT industry and few are truly active, such as proactively networking, joining group discussions and leveraging Q&A function.
This might attribute to the fact that online community was not really considered to be a platform for business networking, recruiting/job hunting and so forth in Japan. Such perception is still minor in Japan although there is a sign that the situation might change in the future, as mentioned in the previous article Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan.
Having said that, the fact that Japanese version has not been available is also a primary reason for LinkedIn not being popular in Japan. There was a news that Japanese version is to be rolled out this June but the roll out seems to be behind their original schedule.
5. How about Google Plus (Google+)?
Google+ is still very new yet grown rapidly in western countries (the U.S. in particular); however, it is still mostly unknown in Japan. It was only in August that the author found one of the first online article posted by a leading Japanese media saying how it is growing dramatically in English speaking countries and its benefits that encompass benefits of Facebook and Twitter.
The author, although had the account and was invited from her non-Japanese Facebook friend soon after Google+ invitation was available in July, started to really use Google+ in August to immediately understand that even few Japanese IT experts in Japan are using and active on Google+ and it is only the real innovators that are posting updates and comments. In fact, the author was extremely surprised that a online friend in IT industry (blogging in Japanese about Internet and social media) sent her a message on Twitter as a reply to her tweet saying about her Google+ blog article that he has created an Google+ account but has not yet understood the merits of Google+.
This is why currently the author mainly uses Google+ to obtain up-to-date information about social media and Internet marketing information; therefore, includes in her circles basically English speaking influencers to follow and to friend with people strong in Internet marketing and technology, and not networking with Japanese people.
6. The author’s final thoughts
Facebook and Twitter that was successful in gaining popularity attributing to strategic use of media is likely to strengthen its popularity especially Facebook, which would contribute to making 2011 truly the first era of SNS/social media in Japan.
The author believes in the potential of LinkedIn and Google+, which is why she has been writing some blog posts about LinkedIn and Google+ for her Japanese blog. The fact that social media has been becoming popular in Japan is a positive factor for sure. If they are strategically rolled out in Japan meeting local needs, marketed and promoted by an effective evangelist, they would surely be used by more Japanese people in Japan.
Resources:-
Twitter and Facebook have gained popularity attributing to how they were introduce by mass media and so forth 2011 is said to be the first era of SNS/social media in Japan, but LinkedIn and Google Plus (Google+) remains unpopular in Japan. Twitter and Facebook popularity is likely to remain strong. Regarding LinkedIn and Google+, if strategically rolled out meeting Japan local needs, and marketed and promoted by an effective evangelist, it is quite possible that they would be used by more Japanese people in Japan.
In this article, the author would like to outline the popularity of the four social media in Japan.
1. How are the four social media popular in Japan?
Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn status has been explained in the previous articles from Vol.45 throughout Vol.47 when the author summarized the social media situation in Japan to conclude 2010 and predicted the trend for 2011, which turned out to be quite true as in Vol.48 – 2011 Japan’s First Year of Social Media / SNS, which was based on a survey result about social media in Japan executed by a leading Japanese media.
In short, local leading SNS called Mixi and local blog called Ameba had been dominating Japan until the recent popularization of Twitter and Facebook. LinkedIn remains unpopular among the majority of the Japanese, so is Google Plus (Google+) which is still unpopular even among majority of online marketers.
2. How is Twitter?
Twitter was the first global social media that became hot in the summer of 2010, when it was featured in a special article in a leading Japanese business magazine together with introduction of applications and celebrities already using Twitter. Together with the localization (Japanese version) that was already available and the ease of use, Twitter immediately became hot among early adaptors including many popular politicians and companies/organizations as well as general public.
There were some online marketers who had been giving seminars about leveraging Twitter but few seemed to blog and/or write a book about it.
3. How is Facebook?
Facebook had mostly been used by bilingual Japanese mostly to be connected with friends outside Japan but Facebook outbreak came in January 2011 when the movie “Social Networking” started in Japan and Facebook was featured in mass media. This was when the author was convinced that “2011 will be the first year of SNS in Japan”.
Unlike Twitter, Facebook was immediately used by a few innovative companies in their marketing, which was featured in series of online articles of a leading Japanese business media. This together with the movie was the advantage the Facebook had over Twitter.
Now there are some online Japanese marketers who constantly blog and/or wrote a book about how to leverage Facebook in marketing. Also, people who first started using Twitter (online marketers in particular) tend to prefer Facebook
4. How about LinkedIn?
Japanese people living in Japan who are on LinkedIn are mostly in HR/recruiting and IT industry and few are truly active, such as proactively networking, joining group discussions and leveraging Q&A function.
This might attribute to the fact that online community was not really considered to be a platform for business networking, recruiting/job hunting and so forth in Japan. Such perception is still minor in Japan although there is a sign that the situation might change in the future, as mentioned in the previous article Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan.
Having said that, the fact that Japanese version has not been available is also a primary reason for LinkedIn not being popular in Japan. There was a news that Japanese version is to be rolled out this June but the roll out seems to be behind their original schedule.
5. How about Google Plus (Google+)?
Google+ is still very new yet grown rapidly in western countries (the U.S. in particular); however, it is still mostly unknown in Japan. It was only in August that the author found one of the first online article posted by a leading Japanese media saying how it is growing dramatically in English speaking countries and its benefits that encompass benefits of Facebook and Twitter.
The author, although had the account and was invited from her non-Japanese Facebook friend soon after Google+ invitation was available in July, started to really use Google+ in August to immediately understand that even few Japanese IT experts in Japan are using and active on Google+ and it is only the real innovators that are posting updates and comments. In fact, the author was extremely surprised that a online friend in IT industry (blogging in Japanese about Internet and social media) sent her a message on Twitter as a reply to her tweet saying about her Google+ blog article that he has created an Google+ account but has not yet understood the merits of Google+.
This is why currently the author mainly uses Google+ to obtain up-to-date information about social media and Internet marketing information; therefore, includes in her circles basically English speaking influencers to follow and to friend with people strong in Internet marketing and technology, and not networking with Japanese people.
6. The author’s final thoughts
Facebook and Twitter that was successful in gaining popularity attributing to strategic use of media is likely to strengthen its popularity especially Facebook, which would contribute to making 2011 truly the first era of SNS/social media in Japan.
The author believes in the potential of LinkedIn and Google+, which is why she has been writing some blog posts about LinkedIn and Google+ for her Japanese blog. The fact that social media has been becoming popular in Japan is a positive factor for sure. If they are strategically rolled out in Japan meeting local needs, marketed and promoted by an effective evangelist, they would surely be used by more Japanese people in Japan.
Resources:-
Twitter and Facebook have gained popularity attributing to how they were introduce by mass media and so forth 2011 is said to be the first era of SNS/social media in Japan, but LinkedIn and Google Plus (Google+) remains unpopular in Japan. Twitter and Facebook popularity is likely to remain strong. Regarding LinkedIn and Google+, if strategically rolled out meeting Japan local needs, and marketed and promoted by an effective evangelist, it is quite possible that they would be used by more Japanese people in Japan.
Saturday, 6 August 2011
Vol.63 – Social Recruiting: Cases and Future of Recruiting in Japan
Following the previous article Vol.62 – Social Media in Recruiting and Job Hunting Spreading in Japan, a few examples of how social media are used in recruiting new graduates by Japanese companies are introduced in this article.
1. Case 1: Honda
When it comes to using social media in marketing such companies as UniQlo are mentioned but when it comes to using social media in recruiting new graduates, Honda needs to be mentioned.
Honda’s case is a good example to show that social media such as Facebook can be an excellent tool to communicate with new graduates around the globe with minimum cost with thorough preparation such as developing and cascading operation guidelines and encouraging employees to regularly participate.
1) What is the stance of the company in leveraging social media?
Honda has posted in their website on March 11, 2011 in Japanese saying that the company is to leverage social media, especially Facebook (and including Twitter, YouTube and UStream), to deliver information about the company online worldwide, thus the company is to open their official account of Facebook and Twitter.
Honda has been leveraging social media before March 2011 in recruiting; the company pened a Facebook Page in December 2010 called “Waigaya” for recruiting new graduates. Waigaya is the term expressing Honda’s corporate culture of everyone freely being able to express their opinion regardless of career, age etc. Facebook is the tool to realize Waigaya online.
2) Why the company decided to leverage Facebook in recruiting new graduates?
Waigawa concept has been implemented offline in the real world a few years ago in recruiting new graduates; employees (recruiters) have been meeting face-to-race new graduates and freely exchanging opinion which helped new graduates better understanding the company. However, the implementation offline in the real world exclusively would limit candidates who can benefit from Waigaya, geologically etc. This is why the company decided to implement it online leveraging Facebook.
Chat function of Facebook is used at a specific time that is decided beforehand in proactive online discussion and information/opinion sharing. The company says that there are few unhealthy comments and constructive discussion is taken place attributing to the fact that basically anonymous user is not accepted on Facebook. The company also says that there are even accesses from Japanese students studying abroad.
2. Case 2: Trenders
Trenders is a Japanese marketing company that recently became hot with the announcement that the company is to adopt “Facebook allocation” in new graduate recruiting for new graduates who are to join the company from April 2012 (i.e. recruiting started in the autumn of 2010 and offer made in Spring 2011), exclusively for active Facebook users i.e. students with over 200 Facebook friends.
1) What is “Facebook allocation” system in recruiting new graduates?
It is a system in which new graduate candidates active on Facebook (with over 200 friends) are allowed to skip earlier processes including attending the first seminar in which company information is provided, resume screening and the first interview. This means that the candidates that meet the criteria can directly start the process from the second interview if they choose to do so.
2) Why the company decided to adopt “Facebook allocation” system?
It is because according to the official announcement made after the adoption, “students with high social competency seemed to have high real communication competency as well”. That is, students with high social media literacy tend to be active in real world communities and/or have studied abroad meaning international experience. In addition, students who proactively obtained information leveraging social media were mostly highly evaluated in interviews regarding proactive self expression.
As a result, the company concludes that they succeeded in recruiting excellent new graduates with the “Facebook allocation” system.
3. Case 3: Gulliver International
Gulliver International is a Japanese leading company specialized in buying and selling used cars. The company has been leveraging Twitter.
The company opened a website aligning/co-related with Twitter called “G!G2012” http://recruit.glv.co.jp/. This is the online community for people whose Twitter accounts are opened to share information and exchange opinions. Such Twitter accounts were opened for multiple HR recruiting mangers, employees who recently joined the company and new graduates who had given the offer.
4. The author’s final thoughts
It is amazing how social media drastically started to spread in the past two years or so and although still only a few innovative, leading companies online, some companies started to leverage social media in recruiting new graduates since autumn 2010, opening the door to social recruiting. The trend is likely to speed up; in an article of Nikkei, a leading newspaper in Japan specialized in business and economy, it was mentioned that some new graduates started to say “we better be on Facebook because it seems that many HR recruiting managers are interested in knowing who are on Facebook”.
The author sees great potential in social recruiting, in recruiting new graduates and mid careers because it opens opportunities for candidates to interact with employees of the companies they are interested in other than HR recruiting managers. Also it allows HR recruiting managers to follow up during the recruiting process and after the offer is given.
Social recruiting requires “openness and transparency” both for the companies (potential employers) and candidates (potential employees), as well as developing and cascading guidelines of leveraging social media (in recruiting) for companies.
Last but not least, it is quite possible that social recruiting may trigger paradigm shift in recruiting and job hunting, and in job market mechanism.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
At last a few innovative Japanese companies started to leverage social media in recruiting new graduates, including Honda that leverages Facebook and Trenders (a marketing company) allowing active Facebook user candidates to skip first few recruiting/screening process. This trend is likely to speed up, opening the door to social recruiting era requiring “openness and transparency”. Social recruiting has a great potential, triggering paradigm shift in recruiting and job hunting, and in job market mechanism.
1. Case 1: Honda
When it comes to using social media in marketing such companies as UniQlo are mentioned but when it comes to using social media in recruiting new graduates, Honda needs to be mentioned.
Honda’s case is a good example to show that social media such as Facebook can be an excellent tool to communicate with new graduates around the globe with minimum cost with thorough preparation such as developing and cascading operation guidelines and encouraging employees to regularly participate.
1) What is the stance of the company in leveraging social media?
Honda has posted in their website on March 11, 2011 in Japanese saying that the company is to leverage social media, especially Facebook (and including Twitter, YouTube and UStream), to deliver information about the company online worldwide, thus the company is to open their official account of Facebook and Twitter.
Honda has been leveraging social media before March 2011 in recruiting; the company pened a Facebook Page in December 2010 called “Waigaya” for recruiting new graduates. Waigaya is the term expressing Honda’s corporate culture of everyone freely being able to express their opinion regardless of career, age etc. Facebook is the tool to realize Waigaya online.
2) Why the company decided to leverage Facebook in recruiting new graduates?
Waigawa concept has been implemented offline in the real world a few years ago in recruiting new graduates; employees (recruiters) have been meeting face-to-race new graduates and freely exchanging opinion which helped new graduates better understanding the company. However, the implementation offline in the real world exclusively would limit candidates who can benefit from Waigaya, geologically etc. This is why the company decided to implement it online leveraging Facebook.
Chat function of Facebook is used at a specific time that is decided beforehand in proactive online discussion and information/opinion sharing. The company says that there are few unhealthy comments and constructive discussion is taken place attributing to the fact that basically anonymous user is not accepted on Facebook. The company also says that there are even accesses from Japanese students studying abroad.
2. Case 2: Trenders
Trenders is a Japanese marketing company that recently became hot with the announcement that the company is to adopt “Facebook allocation” in new graduate recruiting for new graduates who are to join the company from April 2012 (i.e. recruiting started in the autumn of 2010 and offer made in Spring 2011), exclusively for active Facebook users i.e. students with over 200 Facebook friends.
1) What is “Facebook allocation” system in recruiting new graduates?
It is a system in which new graduate candidates active on Facebook (with over 200 friends) are allowed to skip earlier processes including attending the first seminar in which company information is provided, resume screening and the first interview. This means that the candidates that meet the criteria can directly start the process from the second interview if they choose to do so.
2) Why the company decided to adopt “Facebook allocation” system?
It is because according to the official announcement made after the adoption, “students with high social competency seemed to have high real communication competency as well”. That is, students with high social media literacy tend to be active in real world communities and/or have studied abroad meaning international experience. In addition, students who proactively obtained information leveraging social media were mostly highly evaluated in interviews regarding proactive self expression.
As a result, the company concludes that they succeeded in recruiting excellent new graduates with the “Facebook allocation” system.
3. Case 3: Gulliver International
Gulliver International is a Japanese leading company specialized in buying and selling used cars. The company has been leveraging Twitter.
The company opened a website aligning/co-related with Twitter called “G!G2012” http://recruit.glv.co.jp/. This is the online community for people whose Twitter accounts are opened to share information and exchange opinions. Such Twitter accounts were opened for multiple HR recruiting mangers, employees who recently joined the company and new graduates who had given the offer.
4. The author’s final thoughts
It is amazing how social media drastically started to spread in the past two years or so and although still only a few innovative, leading companies online, some companies started to leverage social media in recruiting new graduates since autumn 2010, opening the door to social recruiting. The trend is likely to speed up; in an article of Nikkei, a leading newspaper in Japan specialized in business and economy, it was mentioned that some new graduates started to say “we better be on Facebook because it seems that many HR recruiting managers are interested in knowing who are on Facebook”.
The author sees great potential in social recruiting, in recruiting new graduates and mid careers because it opens opportunities for candidates to interact with employees of the companies they are interested in other than HR recruiting managers. Also it allows HR recruiting managers to follow up during the recruiting process and after the offer is given.
Social recruiting requires “openness and transparency” both for the companies (potential employers) and candidates (potential employees), as well as developing and cascading guidelines of leveraging social media (in recruiting) for companies.
Last but not least, it is quite possible that social recruiting may trigger paradigm shift in recruiting and job hunting, and in job market mechanism.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
At last a few innovative Japanese companies started to leverage social media in recruiting new graduates, including Honda that leverages Facebook and Trenders (a marketing company) allowing active Facebook user candidates to skip first few recruiting/screening process. This trend is likely to speed up, opening the door to social recruiting era requiring “openness and transparency”. Social recruiting has a great potential, triggering paradigm shift in recruiting and job hunting, and in job market mechanism.
Sunday, 24 July 2011
Vol.62 – Social Media in Recruiting and Job Hunting Spreading in Japan
Following the previous article Vol.61 – Recruiting, Job Hunting and Media in Japan Until Today, how social media has started to enter Japan recruiting and job hunting market since 2010 is briefly explained in this article.
1. How social media started to being used in new graduate recruiting in Japan?
How social media started to being used in new graduate recruiting in Japan since 2010 diversifying social media use is best understood by looking back the social media related news and announcement made.
First, from October 1, 2010, Recruit Navi(gation), the leading web portal for new graduate recruiting and job hunting in Japan, made alliance with Facebook connection search.
Then in November 2010, a few Japanese IT companies such as CyberAgent that provides online services such as the most popular blogging platform started to leverage Facebook in recruiting.
Also in November 2010, SoftBank Human Capital started providing a programme/content that supports job hunting leveraging Ustream.
In March 2011, En Japan, a leading recruiting agency in Japan and Microsoft Japan announced that they are to start providing an online service supporting recruiting and job hunting leveraging Facebook.
And in May 2011, Facebook announced that “Work for Us”, a recruiting tool, is to be rolled out in Japan, and LinkedIn is to roll out Japanese version soon.
2. How some recent new Japanese graduates started to leverage social media in job hunting?
The author would like to introduce a case of the new Japanese graduates who fully leveraged social media in their job hunting to answer this. Such a case may still be the exceptions in Japan but such cases are likely to become the majority in the future because the Internet and mobile phones have been around future new graduates since their childhood and they would likely be enjoying social media everyday.
1) What is the profile and background of the new graduate of the case?
The case is of a new graduate who landed on a job leveraging social media to the fullest to start working in an IT company this April.
Being a great fan of western music, she had been enjoying social media (SNS) since junior high school, starting with MySpace which she happened to know from looking at website of the artists. She had been enjoying sending messages to the artists and their blogs, and sharing information with members of the online community.
Then she went to the U.S. for nine months to study English and started Facebook to keep in touch with her friends in Japan. Facebook was still not unknown in Japan so she did so by teaching her friends what Facebook is and how to leverage it.
2) Why did she decide to leverage social media in her job hunting?
With such a background, she decided to leverage social media in her job hunting because she was not comfortable in one-way online communication from companies of traditional web portals such as Recruit Navi(gation).
She first accessed to gather information of the companies she is interested in and selected which companies to apply directly instead of making so many entries via web portals applying to attend seminars.
3) What social media did she leverage in particular?
It was Twitter because then she came up with an idea of leveraging Twitter in connecting directly online with company recruiting managers, making two-way interaction and consequently understanding the company better.
She started to follow companies she is interested in and their recruiting managers, and some business persons, to sending messages directly, leaving comments to their tweets and tweeting to express her own opinion, all to achieve her objective in her style of interactive communication with business persons.
4) What was the difficulty in leveraging social media in job hunting?
It was to find relevant companies and business persons to follow. This is because only limited companies had been leveraging Twitter in recruiting when she was job hunting, i.e. in 2009 and 2010.
5) What was the outcome of leveraging social media?
Despite the difficulty of leveraging social media in job hunting, it was worth an effort; she managed to meet face-to-face with some representatives of the companies. And she decided to join a company after having had a fruitful face-to-face communication with the representative of the company.
In the next article the author would like to explain how a few leading, innovative Japanese companies have started to leverage social media in recruiting in earnest.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
Japan had been behind leveraging social media in recruiting and job hunting but it started to take off recently. Social media use in such area drastically started to diversify since October 2010 and although still extremely limited, there is a case in which a new graduate successfully landed on a job leveraging social media (Twitter) to the fullest.
1. How social media started to being used in new graduate recruiting in Japan?
How social media started to being used in new graduate recruiting in Japan since 2010 diversifying social media use is best understood by looking back the social media related news and announcement made.
First, from October 1, 2010, Recruit Navi(gation), the leading web portal for new graduate recruiting and job hunting in Japan, made alliance with Facebook connection search.
Then in November 2010, a few Japanese IT companies such as CyberAgent that provides online services such as the most popular blogging platform started to leverage Facebook in recruiting.
Also in November 2010, SoftBank Human Capital started providing a programme/content that supports job hunting leveraging Ustream.
In March 2011, En Japan, a leading recruiting agency in Japan and Microsoft Japan announced that they are to start providing an online service supporting recruiting and job hunting leveraging Facebook.
And in May 2011, Facebook announced that “Work for Us”, a recruiting tool, is to be rolled out in Japan, and LinkedIn is to roll out Japanese version soon.
2. How some recent new Japanese graduates started to leverage social media in job hunting?
The author would like to introduce a case of the new Japanese graduates who fully leveraged social media in their job hunting to answer this. Such a case may still be the exceptions in Japan but such cases are likely to become the majority in the future because the Internet and mobile phones have been around future new graduates since their childhood and they would likely be enjoying social media everyday.
1) What is the profile and background of the new graduate of the case?
The case is of a new graduate who landed on a job leveraging social media to the fullest to start working in an IT company this April.
Being a great fan of western music, she had been enjoying social media (SNS) since junior high school, starting with MySpace which she happened to know from looking at website of the artists. She had been enjoying sending messages to the artists and their blogs, and sharing information with members of the online community.
Then she went to the U.S. for nine months to study English and started Facebook to keep in touch with her friends in Japan. Facebook was still not unknown in Japan so she did so by teaching her friends what Facebook is and how to leverage it.
2) Why did she decide to leverage social media in her job hunting?
With such a background, she decided to leverage social media in her job hunting because she was not comfortable in one-way online communication from companies of traditional web portals such as Recruit Navi(gation).
She first accessed to gather information of the companies she is interested in and selected which companies to apply directly instead of making so many entries via web portals applying to attend seminars.
3) What social media did she leverage in particular?
It was Twitter because then she came up with an idea of leveraging Twitter in connecting directly online with company recruiting managers, making two-way interaction and consequently understanding the company better.
She started to follow companies she is interested in and their recruiting managers, and some business persons, to sending messages directly, leaving comments to their tweets and tweeting to express her own opinion, all to achieve her objective in her style of interactive communication with business persons.
4) What was the difficulty in leveraging social media in job hunting?
It was to find relevant companies and business persons to follow. This is because only limited companies had been leveraging Twitter in recruiting when she was job hunting, i.e. in 2009 and 2010.
5) What was the outcome of leveraging social media?
Despite the difficulty of leveraging social media in job hunting, it was worth an effort; she managed to meet face-to-face with some representatives of the companies. And she decided to join a company after having had a fruitful face-to-face communication with the representative of the company.
In the next article the author would like to explain how a few leading, innovative Japanese companies have started to leverage social media in recruiting in earnest.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
Japan had been behind leveraging social media in recruiting and job hunting but it started to take off recently. Social media use in such area drastically started to diversify since October 2010 and although still extremely limited, there is a case in which a new graduate successfully landed on a job leveraging social media (Twitter) to the fullest.
Monday, 18 July 2011
Vol.61 – Recruiting, Job Hunting and Media in Japan Until Today
Social Media has rapidly started to proliferate to change recruiting and job hunting in Japan since Twitter got hot in 2010 and Facebook in 2011 and thus 2011 is said to be the first year of social media in Japan. Thus a leading job hunting and recruiting agency in Japan predicted that 2011 will be the first year of “social recruiting and job hunting” and recently there was a special article on this topic in a leading Japanese human management magazine.
The author would like to introduce and explain the essence of the article in series of articles, starting with history of new graduate recruiting and media.
1. What was the first media for job hunting and recruiting in Japan
It was a guidebook, later called “Recruit Book” with information about job hunting that was issued in 1962. New graduates applied by sending in hard copy documents (resume etc.) based on the guidebook.
2. When did the Internet emerge in job hunting in Japan?
It was in February 1996 when the web site called “Recruit Book on the Net” opened. The web site name later was changed to “Recruit Navi(gation)”. This marked the turning point in media in job hunting and recruiting, from printed media such as guidebooks, direct mails and hard copy job postings to the Internet.
Such change in media in job hunting and recruiting made anyone interested in the opportunity access the information online and made the job hunting and recruiting web sites extremely popular to become huge portal web sites. There are currently some such portal web sites that to which more than 400,000 students have registered and over 8,000 companies provide recruiting information.
3. How has the Internet changed job hunting in Japan?
Portal web sites and the Internet established a new system of “web entry” that has become something normal today, in which students apply from online application form. With this system, students became free from complicated procedures of requesting company brochures and applying to attend seminars by post cards and telephones, meaning they approach to many companies with ease.
4. What is the primary problem of the job hunting and recruiting leveraging the Internet?
It is inefficiency and mismatch in the beginning phase of recruiting and job hunting.
So many students apply to well known companies, sometimes as many as 100,000. On the other hand, unknown small and mid-sized companies cannot attract candidates even if they post their information online, on such portal web sites.
Moreover, due to such an ease of online application of “web entry”, there are quite a few students who make online application even if they have no real intention of being screened and/or joining the company.
5. What is one possible reason for such problems?
It is the fact that information posted on such portal web sites limit quality and quantity of online information although it is far superior compared with traditional printed media.
It is for this reason that social media is expected to cover ups for such shortcomings of portal web sites.
In the next articles the author would like to explain how social media is recently being used in job hunting and recruiting by some innovative companies and individuals in Japan.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
The first portal web site in Japan that opened in 1996 changed job hunting and recruiting in Japan completely but this also triggered problems of inefficiency and mismatch in the first phase of recruiting attributing to ease of online application. Social media is expected to cover up for such shortcomings.
The author would like to introduce and explain the essence of the article in series of articles, starting with history of new graduate recruiting and media.
1. What was the first media for job hunting and recruiting in Japan
It was a guidebook, later called “Recruit Book” with information about job hunting that was issued in 1962. New graduates applied by sending in hard copy documents (resume etc.) based on the guidebook.
2. When did the Internet emerge in job hunting in Japan?
It was in February 1996 when the web site called “Recruit Book on the Net” opened. The web site name later was changed to “Recruit Navi(gation)”. This marked the turning point in media in job hunting and recruiting, from printed media such as guidebooks, direct mails and hard copy job postings to the Internet.
Such change in media in job hunting and recruiting made anyone interested in the opportunity access the information online and made the job hunting and recruiting web sites extremely popular to become huge portal web sites. There are currently some such portal web sites that to which more than 400,000 students have registered and over 8,000 companies provide recruiting information.
3. How has the Internet changed job hunting in Japan?
Portal web sites and the Internet established a new system of “web entry” that has become something normal today, in which students apply from online application form. With this system, students became free from complicated procedures of requesting company brochures and applying to attend seminars by post cards and telephones, meaning they approach to many companies with ease.
4. What is the primary problem of the job hunting and recruiting leveraging the Internet?
It is inefficiency and mismatch in the beginning phase of recruiting and job hunting.
So many students apply to well known companies, sometimes as many as 100,000. On the other hand, unknown small and mid-sized companies cannot attract candidates even if they post their information online, on such portal web sites.
Moreover, due to such an ease of online application of “web entry”, there are quite a few students who make online application even if they have no real intention of being screened and/or joining the company.
5. What is one possible reason for such problems?
It is the fact that information posted on such portal web sites limit quality and quantity of online information although it is far superior compared with traditional printed media.
It is for this reason that social media is expected to cover ups for such shortcomings of portal web sites.
In the next articles the author would like to explain how social media is recently being used in job hunting and recruiting by some innovative companies and individuals in Japan.
References:-
“Leveraging Twitter and Facebook in New Graduate Recruiting” by Yoshioka, Mina, from Monthly HRM Materials (July 2011 Edition) – Business Publishing P29-43 (In Japanese)
http://www.busi-pub.com/
Resources:-
The first portal web site in Japan that opened in 1996 changed job hunting and recruiting in Japan completely but this also triggered problems of inefficiency and mismatch in the first phase of recruiting attributing to ease of online application. Social media is expected to cover up for such shortcomings.
Vol.60 – Innovative Way of Twitter Use in Japan
Twitter, handy microblogging of 140 characters, can be combined with another communication channel of offline, is now used in an innovative way in a place in Tokyo, Japan that probably the developers of Twitter had never thought of.
1. How is Twitter used in what situation?
Twitter is displayed in an electronic bulletin board located in a large crossroads in Tokyo, owned and managed by a hair cut shop.
Tweets range from news and staff member introduction of the shop to comments on the hot topic discussed in the society and media.
2. What is the benefit of using Twitter in such a way and situation?
It allows many people accessible to the shop read the tweets, which is an extremely effective way of attracting current and potential customers. Allowing people walking in the crossroads where the shop is located is of more ROI than allowing nationwide or worldwide online users who cannot come to the shop read blogs and tweets.
140 characters is optimum to read when people are waiting for the traffic light to turn to green from red, although the volume and content is greater in Japanese than in English due to the difference in the characteristics of the two languages. People have nothing else to do when they are waiting for the traffic light to turn green from red so they would read the tweets thus the “reach” is extremely high and effective.
3. Is there any other organization(s) that use Twitter in a similar way?
Yes, there is. It is a commercial facility used by multiple tenants in Tokyo, reported in a recent article on June 20 by a Japanese newspaper specialized in retailing industry.
When the facility opened in October last year, Twitter accounts for all tenants were created so that tweets of each tenant can be displayed in the electronic bulletin board of the facility.
4. How effective is the new use of Twitter by the other organization?
According to the administrator of the facility, this method allows far more information to be delivered to great number of target customers compared with simply tweeting online.
This is because of the two reasons.
The first is reaching greater number of targets. The number of followers of the tenants is around 400 at the most. But major department stores and others in the neighbourhood attract 13.36 million visitors per year (for the fiscal year ending March 2011), all of them are current or potential customers.
The second is the fact that that still only a small proportion of the target customers still do not use Twitter. Main target of the facility and the neighbourhood department stores are senior people and majority of such people still do not use Twitter.
5. What was the reason for coming up with such an idea/breakthrough?
It was the fact that the two cases are free from stereotype/fixed idea that blogs and Twitter is the tool used to online only.
It is true that characteristics of Twitter include real time, interactive and viral, and they are neglected in the two cases introduced above. What was focused and leveraged is “very simply to tweet, even for extremely busy staff working in the shop floor”, and this was the critical requirement for the two cases.
As a result, in two cases, Twitter is used primarily to deliver information one-way which might be not what it was expected when it was first developed; however, the objective of reaching as many target audience to deliver information is achieved.
Resources:-
Twitter use can be combined with bulletin board function by displaying tweets on electronic bulletin board, to achieve an objective of reaching as many target audience to deliver information, although in this case Twitter is used primarily to deliver information one-way and interactivity and other characteristics of Twitter is neglected. Such an innovative idea attributes to being free from stereotype/fixed idea that blogs and Twitter are used only online.
1. How is Twitter used in what situation?
Twitter is displayed in an electronic bulletin board located in a large crossroads in Tokyo, owned and managed by a hair cut shop.
Tweets range from news and staff member introduction of the shop to comments on the hot topic discussed in the society and media.
2. What is the benefit of using Twitter in such a way and situation?
It allows many people accessible to the shop read the tweets, which is an extremely effective way of attracting current and potential customers. Allowing people walking in the crossroads where the shop is located is of more ROI than allowing nationwide or worldwide online users who cannot come to the shop read blogs and tweets.
140 characters is optimum to read when people are waiting for the traffic light to turn to green from red, although the volume and content is greater in Japanese than in English due to the difference in the characteristics of the two languages. People have nothing else to do when they are waiting for the traffic light to turn green from red so they would read the tweets thus the “reach” is extremely high and effective.
3. Is there any other organization(s) that use Twitter in a similar way?
Yes, there is. It is a commercial facility used by multiple tenants in Tokyo, reported in a recent article on June 20 by a Japanese newspaper specialized in retailing industry.
When the facility opened in October last year, Twitter accounts for all tenants were created so that tweets of each tenant can be displayed in the electronic bulletin board of the facility.
4. How effective is the new use of Twitter by the other organization?
According to the administrator of the facility, this method allows far more information to be delivered to great number of target customers compared with simply tweeting online.
This is because of the two reasons.
The first is reaching greater number of targets. The number of followers of the tenants is around 400 at the most. But major department stores and others in the neighbourhood attract 13.36 million visitors per year (for the fiscal year ending March 2011), all of them are current or potential customers.
The second is the fact that that still only a small proportion of the target customers still do not use Twitter. Main target of the facility and the neighbourhood department stores are senior people and majority of such people still do not use Twitter.
5. What was the reason for coming up with such an idea/breakthrough?
It was the fact that the two cases are free from stereotype/fixed idea that blogs and Twitter is the tool used to online only.
It is true that characteristics of Twitter include real time, interactive and viral, and they are neglected in the two cases introduced above. What was focused and leveraged is “very simply to tweet, even for extremely busy staff working in the shop floor”, and this was the critical requirement for the two cases.
As a result, in two cases, Twitter is used primarily to deliver information one-way which might be not what it was expected when it was first developed; however, the objective of reaching as many target audience to deliver information is achieved.
Resources:-
Twitter use can be combined with bulletin board function by displaying tweets on electronic bulletin board, to achieve an objective of reaching as many target audience to deliver information, although in this case Twitter is used primarily to deliver information one-way and interactivity and other characteristics of Twitter is neglected. Such an innovative idea attributes to being free from stereotype/fixed idea that blogs and Twitter are used only online.
Friday, 24 June 2011
Vol.59 – Social Media Becoming a Must for the Japan Disaster Victims
Following the previous article Vol.58 – Reality of Social Media Among Victims of the Japan Disaster the author would like to introduce two examples of how social media, which had not been much used by people in the devastated area before the Japan disaster, is now becoming something inevitable for the victims.
1. Source of information to protect themselves from radiation
1) Case: How social media is used to get information in protecting themselves from radiation
A housewife living in Fukushima always has her smart phone with her that he had installed an inevitable application. With the application, she leverages geo-location functions to know at a glance where she is, amount of radiation and wind direction.
She checks such information whenever she goes out, to protect her two children and herself from radiation. She uses the application as much as five or six times a day.
2) How the application was developed
The application was developed by an engineer working in Fujitsu group, living in Yokohama. He developed it after work and at weekends and published online for free, and he has been improving it late at night based on feedback and requests from the users. Now it has been downloaded more than 33,000 times in total.
3) More applications are being developed
There is an organization established by volunteer engineers from Google, Microsoft, Rakuten and other IT companies called “Hack For Japan”, which has been applications to help victims of the disaster one after the other.
Hackers include those that work with the objectives of contributing to the society and the organization is such a great example. Over 600 such people joined the organization and have developed over 40 applications, including an application of a system that manages volunteer centres. Such applications are being used heavily as something inevitable in their lives by victims.
2. Platform / tool in making a living in the near future
1) Case: Online community for victims to work via the Internet / social media
In this concept which is to become a reality in the near future, 1,000 victims will be able to have a new job. Tasks include data input, writing and so forth. Forking 8 hours a day for 21 days a month makes income of moderate 100,000 yen.
2) How this idea came up
It was an Internet venture company in Tokyo that came up with this idea. The company plans to undertake assignments from larger companies and organizations, and ask victims in the online community to do the tasks.
The executive of the company sincerely hopes that it would provide an opportunity for victims to make a living when they cannot evacuate from the devastated area because they have children or someone they have to look after, etc.
3) The upcoming plans
The company plans to start the business from July and is making haste in its preparation such as acquiring PCs that they are to rent to victims.
3. The author’s final thoughts
It is quite true that with the Internet and social media it is possible to provide information, wisdom and benevolence from around the globe to the devastated area, on condition that the digital divide mentioned in the previous article is eliminated.
What are introduced in the previous and this article would highly contribute to elimination of the digital divide, opening a new channel/source of inevitable information for their lives for victims. It means new lifestyle for the victims to take root even after they come to be able to lead normal live like pre-disaster. And it means new market created or expanded for online business owners and marketers.
Resources:-
Internet and social media is becoming inevitable for the Japan disaster victims, thanks to hard work of volunteer engineers developing useful, inevitable applications for victims. Online community to create 1000 jobs for victims is also to open from July by a venture company in Tokyo. Such trends are likely to minimize or eliminate digital divide, to change lifestyle of the victims, meaning market creation/expansion for online business owners and marketers.
1. Source of information to protect themselves from radiation
1) Case: How social media is used to get information in protecting themselves from radiation
A housewife living in Fukushima always has her smart phone with her that he had installed an inevitable application. With the application, she leverages geo-location functions to know at a glance where she is, amount of radiation and wind direction.
She checks such information whenever she goes out, to protect her two children and herself from radiation. She uses the application as much as five or six times a day.
2) How the application was developed
The application was developed by an engineer working in Fujitsu group, living in Yokohama. He developed it after work and at weekends and published online for free, and he has been improving it late at night based on feedback and requests from the users. Now it has been downloaded more than 33,000 times in total.
3) More applications are being developed
There is an organization established by volunteer engineers from Google, Microsoft, Rakuten and other IT companies called “Hack For Japan”, which has been applications to help victims of the disaster one after the other.
Hackers include those that work with the objectives of contributing to the society and the organization is such a great example. Over 600 such people joined the organization and have developed over 40 applications, including an application of a system that manages volunteer centres. Such applications are being used heavily as something inevitable in their lives by victims.
2. Platform / tool in making a living in the near future
1) Case: Online community for victims to work via the Internet / social media
In this concept which is to become a reality in the near future, 1,000 victims will be able to have a new job. Tasks include data input, writing and so forth. Forking 8 hours a day for 21 days a month makes income of moderate 100,000 yen.
2) How this idea came up
It was an Internet venture company in Tokyo that came up with this idea. The company plans to undertake assignments from larger companies and organizations, and ask victims in the online community to do the tasks.
The executive of the company sincerely hopes that it would provide an opportunity for victims to make a living when they cannot evacuate from the devastated area because they have children or someone they have to look after, etc.
3) The upcoming plans
The company plans to start the business from July and is making haste in its preparation such as acquiring PCs that they are to rent to victims.
3. The author’s final thoughts
It is quite true that with the Internet and social media it is possible to provide information, wisdom and benevolence from around the globe to the devastated area, on condition that the digital divide mentioned in the previous article is eliminated.
What are introduced in the previous and this article would highly contribute to elimination of the digital divide, opening a new channel/source of inevitable information for their lives for victims. It means new lifestyle for the victims to take root even after they come to be able to lead normal live like pre-disaster. And it means new market created or expanded for online business owners and marketers.
Resources:-
Internet and social media is becoming inevitable for the Japan disaster victims, thanks to hard work of volunteer engineers developing useful, inevitable applications for victims. Online community to create 1000 jobs for victims is also to open from July by a venture company in Tokyo. Such trends are likely to minimize or eliminate digital divide, to change lifestyle of the victims, meaning market creation/expansion for online business owners and marketers.
Sunday, 19 June 2011
Vol.58 – Reality of Social Media Among Victims of the Japan Disaster
Information on the Japan disaster has been online and shared by social media worldwide ever since the disaster broke out on March 11 so everyone believed that social media played an important part in sharing information about the disaster.
However, the reality was that social media had not bee effective in the devastated area. This is because the information was shared mostly among people who had not suffered from the disaster, according to an article of Nikkei, Japan’s leading newspaper specialized in business and economy, reported on June 19.
Why was it? How is it now?
1. Why was the social media ineffective among victims of the disaster?
Of course it was because the electricity and telecommunication systems went down by the tsunami; however, that is not all the reason.
The biggest reason is digital divide. It is those who leverage PC and smart phones to get and share online information that benefit from social media. People who do not leverage such IT devices will not. Such a digital divide became prominent by the disaster.
2. Is there any data to support such a digital divide?
Yes, there is. It is the survey result of how telecommunication is used announced by Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) for 2010 announced in May.
According to the result, 83% of individuals in Tokyo use the Internet when it is only 71.8% in average for the 3 devastated prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima.
When it comes to how SNS is used, only 5.4% in average for the 3 devastated prefectures use SNS, which is only half of that of Tokyo.
3. Has the digital divide been diminishing since the disaster?
Yes, there is a sign that the situation is changing in the devastated area and that the digital divide has been diminishing.
Quite a few victims still living in the disaster started using Twitter to share information online with friends living in the same village; i.e. among people of real, offline community. Such communities, in some cases, have expanded to outside of the offline community such as professors in Tokyo specialized in bio energy, connected online.
They would share and discuss online about such topic as possibilities of generating energy from algae in the devastated area.
4. Who taught such victims to use Twitter?
It was a man who had started a venture business in the area of optics in Sendai. In his hometown in the devastated area of Tohoku, there has been a customs in which friends in neighbourhood get together to enjoy conversation over tea. That is to say people were “connected” in the real, offline world.
5. Why did the man teach Twitter to victims?
It was to maintain the current community/network of the victims.
Victims living in the same evacuation centres constituting the same community are connected offline. However, they would be disconnected when their life in evacuation finished; some people would move to temporary houses, some would return to their home, and some others would move to other parts in Japan. Thus their current “community” would be demolished.
The man wanted to maintain the network/community leveraging the Internet and therefore he returned to his hometown in the devastated area to proliferate the Internet and social media. He also called for others to join him and by the end of May, 10 people joined him from such places as Hokkaido University.
As long as connected, the Internet and social media can leash its power and potential.
In the next article, the author would like to introduce how the Internet and social media has started to become a critical part of the daily lives victims.
Resources:-
Surprisingly, the Internet and social media had not been ineffective among victims of the Japan disaster immediately after the breakout of the disaster. It was not only because electricity and mobile phone terminals went down but primarily digital divide. However, with an initiative by a man, many victims started using Twitter to share information online. This would also contribute to maintaining network/community that is likely to be abolished when living in evacuation centres finishes for victims.
However, the reality was that social media had not bee effective in the devastated area. This is because the information was shared mostly among people who had not suffered from the disaster, according to an article of Nikkei, Japan’s leading newspaper specialized in business and economy, reported on June 19.
Why was it? How is it now?
1. Why was the social media ineffective among victims of the disaster?
Of course it was because the electricity and telecommunication systems went down by the tsunami; however, that is not all the reason.
The biggest reason is digital divide. It is those who leverage PC and smart phones to get and share online information that benefit from social media. People who do not leverage such IT devices will not. Such a digital divide became prominent by the disaster.
2. Is there any data to support such a digital divide?
Yes, there is. It is the survey result of how telecommunication is used announced by Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) for 2010 announced in May.
According to the result, 83% of individuals in Tokyo use the Internet when it is only 71.8% in average for the 3 devastated prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima.
When it comes to how SNS is used, only 5.4% in average for the 3 devastated prefectures use SNS, which is only half of that of Tokyo.
3. Has the digital divide been diminishing since the disaster?
Yes, there is a sign that the situation is changing in the devastated area and that the digital divide has been diminishing.
Quite a few victims still living in the disaster started using Twitter to share information online with friends living in the same village; i.e. among people of real, offline community. Such communities, in some cases, have expanded to outside of the offline community such as professors in Tokyo specialized in bio energy, connected online.
They would share and discuss online about such topic as possibilities of generating energy from algae in the devastated area.
4. Who taught such victims to use Twitter?
It was a man who had started a venture business in the area of optics in Sendai. In his hometown in the devastated area of Tohoku, there has been a customs in which friends in neighbourhood get together to enjoy conversation over tea. That is to say people were “connected” in the real, offline world.
5. Why did the man teach Twitter to victims?
It was to maintain the current community/network of the victims.
Victims living in the same evacuation centres constituting the same community are connected offline. However, they would be disconnected when their life in evacuation finished; some people would move to temporary houses, some would return to their home, and some others would move to other parts in Japan. Thus their current “community” would be demolished.
The man wanted to maintain the network/community leveraging the Internet and therefore he returned to his hometown in the devastated area to proliferate the Internet and social media. He also called for others to join him and by the end of May, 10 people joined him from such places as Hokkaido University.
As long as connected, the Internet and social media can leash its power and potential.
In the next article, the author would like to introduce how the Internet and social media has started to become a critical part of the daily lives victims.
Resources:-
Surprisingly, the Internet and social media had not been ineffective among victims of the Japan disaster immediately after the breakout of the disaster. It was not only because electricity and mobile phone terminals went down but primarily digital divide. However, with an initiative by a man, many victims started using Twitter to share information online. This would also contribute to maintaining network/community that is likely to be abolished when living in evacuation centres finishes for victims.
Saturday, 28 May 2011
Vol.57 – Will Social Media Business Use Spread Among Japanese Companies?
There are a few Japanese companies such as SoftBank and Fast Retailing (famous for Uniqlo brand) that have started leveraging social media, the majority of traditional Japanese companies are far behind in leveraging social media in their marketing, communication and business.
Will the situation remain the same over the next few years?
In this article, the author would like to introduce the essence of the survey result about how social media is used that was executed by Nikkei Computer, a leading Japanese magazine specialized in IT and computer.
The answer to the article title question is that although it requires time and overcoming possible hurdles, more Japanese companies would likely to start leverage social media.
1. What is the overview of the survey?
- Executed by: Nikkei PC, a leading Japanese magazine specialized in IT and computer
- Timing: April 20 – 28, 2011
- Respondents:
Gender: male = 93.2%, female – 6.6%
Age: less than 19 = 0.3%, 20s = 3.4%, 30s = 21.2%, 40s = 42.2%, over 50 = 30.7%
2. How are social media currently used?
1) Social media vehicles used
The most popular social media vehicle used is Twitter with 39.9%, followed by mixi (the leading local SNS) with 31.6% and Facebook with 24.4%. 5.1% replied as others (e.g. GREE and DeNA, Japan local SNS with gaming functions) while 44.6% replied that they do not use any.
Approximately 700 million people use Facebook worldwide but popularization of Facebook is still ongoing in Japan with only approximately 3 million people in Japan that use Facebook at present. Thus the reality is that it is far less people in Japan use Facebook compared with mixi used by 23 million people.
However, there is not such a big difference in number of people using the two SNS from the survey, which means Facebook is proliferating among the IT professionals (i.e. likely innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media).
2) Objectives of the social media use
Each social media vehicles is used with different objectives. Main objectives of using Twitter is getting information before traditional media (newspaper and TV) and reading tweets of celebrities to know their thoughts. On the other hand, SNS such as mixi and Facebook are primarily used to communicate casually with friends and acquaintances and connecting with new friends and acquaintances online.
Answer to the questions “what is your objective of using social media? (multiple answers accepted up to 3)” N=4,003
Answer / Twitter / Facebook / mixi
Get info before newspaper & TV / 49.3% / 31.9% / 5.8%
Casually communicate with friends & acquaintances / 31.9% / 60.1% / 71.5%
Know thoughts etc. of celebrities / 37.2% / 10.5% / 5.2%
Get info on products & services of interest / 20.6% / 12.1% / 8.6%
Get public info from government & administration / 10.2% / 2.2% / 0.3%
Post one’s thoughts & opinion / 30.9% / 20.3% / 20.4%
Connect with new friends & acquaintances 8.7% / 21.9% / 22.5%
Advertise & promote products & services / 2.7% / 3.2% / 0.5%
Enjoy applications & gaming / 0.6% / 3.4% / 12.5%
Others / 11.7% / 19.1% / 13.0%
Source: Nikkei Computer
3) How real name is revealed
83.4% of Facebook users reveal their real name in their profile but only 14.9% of Twitter users and 13.5% of mixi users reveal their real name on their profile.
The main reason for revealing their real name in social media profile is to make their friends and acquaintances be able to find them online by search.
4) Use of social media when the disaster occurred in March
23.3% respondents answered that social media was helpful in confirming safety of their family, friends, acquaintances and employees. This was because compared to phones social media was a far more stable communication tool in the turmoil of the disaster outbreak.
22.6% answered that they used social media to confirm the information of TV and newspapers, 20.2% answered that they used to get information posted by victims, and 20.1% answered to get public information from the national and local government.
The background of such use is the increase in value (reliability) of information shared by social media. 15.3% of social media users answered that social media has become more reliable than traditional media and 15.2% answered that social media has become as reliable as traditional media, when only 4.6% answered that social media has become less reliable than traditional media.
Having said that, challenges of social media were pointed out by respondents 63.2% answered that disinformation and incorrect information can be easily spread by social media and 34.1% answered that many users do not reveal their real name thus much information cannot necessarily be trusted.
5) Major comments from the respondents about importance of social media and outlook of its popularity
- Social media is good to share and obtain thoughts and opinions of various people.
- Validity of social media drew attention immediately after the disaster outbreak. People started to acknowledge social media as simply a communication tool to strategic information sharing tool.
- Guideline(s) should be developed to proactively leverage social media.
- Social media is useful in getting information but how to judge credibility would be an issue in social media operation.
- In Japan private use will probably increase more than business use.
- Social media is still only hot among partial online users and cannot yet understand its good points.
- Unreliable information is shared attributing to online anonymity which makes screening of accurate and valuable information difficult.
- People should not say they do not like/use social media without first trying it out.
- Information shared by social media is of variety of levels in reliability etc. and to leverage social media the user needs knowledge and competency (i.e. social media literacy).
3. How is social media used in companies – now and future?
1) Now
It is obvious from the results above that the respondents (i.e. representatives of innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media in Japan) have started to proactively use social media as “personal use”.
However, the companies and organizations they belong to are still struggling how to perceive and handle social media. Only 13.0% have already developed guidelines in employees using social media when as much as 43.9% have not developed and have no plan of developing such guidelines. There are some companies that classify social media as “web site banned from accessing or of warning”, which is an issue to be solved before developing such guidelines.
The background to such a situation is the fact that at present social media has not yet become something that can be useful at work. Only 1.8% answered that social media is vital at work and only 8.6% answered it is useful at work, when 51.6% answered that it is not useful at work.
2) Future
It is quite possible that social media will gradually proliferate in Japan, similarly to western countries. When asked how social media is likely to be in three years time, 5.7% answered that it will be vital at work, 21.1% answered that it will be useful at work and 36.3% answered that it will be of some reference at work.
4. The author’s final thoughts
It is not long before individuals and companies/organizations in Japan would need to think in earnest how to leverage social media.
Some of the things that need to be done on individual level include developing social media literacy so that then can distinguish valuable and reliable information from disinformation and incorrect information and being responsible of what information to share and how. The individuals also need to be mature to know and put into practice other netiquette such as not criticizing people and not violating privacy.
For the companies and organizations, they would first need to understand that they would be able to benefit from correct use of social media. Then they would need to commit themselves to leveraging social media and then develop social media guidelines and educate their employees/staff members, and develop and roll out their social media strategy.
References:-
Ogasawara, Kei (May 19, 2011) Social Media has Proliferated to the Majority, Its Reliability Increased by the Disaster (in Japanese)
http://itpro.nikkeibp.co.jp/article/Watcher/20110513/360312/?ST=cio&P=1
Resources:-
From the recent survey about social media executed to people representing innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media in Japan, it can be said that social media is spreading in Japan although mostly as private use. Business use will surely start to spread in the future as well, which requires individuals to improve their social media literacy and companies/organizations to develop guidelines, develop and roll out strategy, all with understanding that correct use of social media with commitment would be beneficial to them.
Will the situation remain the same over the next few years?
In this article, the author would like to introduce the essence of the survey result about how social media is used that was executed by Nikkei Computer, a leading Japanese magazine specialized in IT and computer.
The answer to the article title question is that although it requires time and overcoming possible hurdles, more Japanese companies would likely to start leverage social media.
1. What is the overview of the survey?
- Executed by: Nikkei PC, a leading Japanese magazine specialized in IT and computer
- Timing: April 20 – 28, 2011
- Respondents:
Gender: male = 93.2%, female – 6.6%
Age: less than 19 = 0.3%, 20s = 3.4%, 30s = 21.2%, 40s = 42.2%, over 50 = 30.7%
2. How are social media currently used?
1) Social media vehicles used
The most popular social media vehicle used is Twitter with 39.9%, followed by mixi (the leading local SNS) with 31.6% and Facebook with 24.4%. 5.1% replied as others (e.g. GREE and DeNA, Japan local SNS with gaming functions) while 44.6% replied that they do not use any.
Approximately 700 million people use Facebook worldwide but popularization of Facebook is still ongoing in Japan with only approximately 3 million people in Japan that use Facebook at present. Thus the reality is that it is far less people in Japan use Facebook compared with mixi used by 23 million people.
However, there is not such a big difference in number of people using the two SNS from the survey, which means Facebook is proliferating among the IT professionals (i.e. likely innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media).
2) Objectives of the social media use
Each social media vehicles is used with different objectives. Main objectives of using Twitter is getting information before traditional media (newspaper and TV) and reading tweets of celebrities to know their thoughts. On the other hand, SNS such as mixi and Facebook are primarily used to communicate casually with friends and acquaintances and connecting with new friends and acquaintances online.
Answer to the questions “what is your objective of using social media? (multiple answers accepted up to 3)” N=4,003
Answer / Twitter / Facebook / mixi
Get info before newspaper & TV / 49.3% / 31.9% / 5.8%
Casually communicate with friends & acquaintances / 31.9% / 60.1% / 71.5%
Know thoughts etc. of celebrities / 37.2% / 10.5% / 5.2%
Get info on products & services of interest / 20.6% / 12.1% / 8.6%
Get public info from government & administration / 10.2% / 2.2% / 0.3%
Post one’s thoughts & opinion / 30.9% / 20.3% / 20.4%
Connect with new friends & acquaintances 8.7% / 21.9% / 22.5%
Advertise & promote products & services / 2.7% / 3.2% / 0.5%
Enjoy applications & gaming / 0.6% / 3.4% / 12.5%
Others / 11.7% / 19.1% / 13.0%
Source: Nikkei Computer
3) How real name is revealed
83.4% of Facebook users reveal their real name in their profile but only 14.9% of Twitter users and 13.5% of mixi users reveal their real name on their profile.
The main reason for revealing their real name in social media profile is to make their friends and acquaintances be able to find them online by search.
4) Use of social media when the disaster occurred in March
23.3% respondents answered that social media was helpful in confirming safety of their family, friends, acquaintances and employees. This was because compared to phones social media was a far more stable communication tool in the turmoil of the disaster outbreak.
22.6% answered that they used social media to confirm the information of TV and newspapers, 20.2% answered that they used to get information posted by victims, and 20.1% answered to get public information from the national and local government.
The background of such use is the increase in value (reliability) of information shared by social media. 15.3% of social media users answered that social media has become more reliable than traditional media and 15.2% answered that social media has become as reliable as traditional media, when only 4.6% answered that social media has become less reliable than traditional media.
Having said that, challenges of social media were pointed out by respondents 63.2% answered that disinformation and incorrect information can be easily spread by social media and 34.1% answered that many users do not reveal their real name thus much information cannot necessarily be trusted.
5) Major comments from the respondents about importance of social media and outlook of its popularity
- Social media is good to share and obtain thoughts and opinions of various people.
- Validity of social media drew attention immediately after the disaster outbreak. People started to acknowledge social media as simply a communication tool to strategic information sharing tool.
- Guideline(s) should be developed to proactively leverage social media.
- Social media is useful in getting information but how to judge credibility would be an issue in social media operation.
- In Japan private use will probably increase more than business use.
- Social media is still only hot among partial online users and cannot yet understand its good points.
- Unreliable information is shared attributing to online anonymity which makes screening of accurate and valuable information difficult.
- People should not say they do not like/use social media without first trying it out.
- Information shared by social media is of variety of levels in reliability etc. and to leverage social media the user needs knowledge and competency (i.e. social media literacy).
3. How is social media used in companies – now and future?
1) Now
It is obvious from the results above that the respondents (i.e. representatives of innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media in Japan) have started to proactively use social media as “personal use”.
However, the companies and organizations they belong to are still struggling how to perceive and handle social media. Only 13.0% have already developed guidelines in employees using social media when as much as 43.9% have not developed and have no plan of developing such guidelines. There are some companies that classify social media as “web site banned from accessing or of warning”, which is an issue to be solved before developing such guidelines.
The background to such a situation is the fact that at present social media has not yet become something that can be useful at work. Only 1.8% answered that social media is vital at work and only 8.6% answered it is useful at work, when 51.6% answered that it is not useful at work.
2) Future
It is quite possible that social media will gradually proliferate in Japan, similarly to western countries. When asked how social media is likely to be in three years time, 5.7% answered that it will be vital at work, 21.1% answered that it will be useful at work and 36.3% answered that it will be of some reference at work.
4. The author’s final thoughts
It is not long before individuals and companies/organizations in Japan would need to think in earnest how to leverage social media.
Some of the things that need to be done on individual level include developing social media literacy so that then can distinguish valuable and reliable information from disinformation and incorrect information and being responsible of what information to share and how. The individuals also need to be mature to know and put into practice other netiquette such as not criticizing people and not violating privacy.
For the companies and organizations, they would first need to understand that they would be able to benefit from correct use of social media. Then they would need to commit themselves to leveraging social media and then develop social media guidelines and educate their employees/staff members, and develop and roll out their social media strategy.
References:-
Ogasawara, Kei (May 19, 2011) Social Media has Proliferated to the Majority, Its Reliability Increased by the Disaster (in Japanese)
http://itpro.nikkeibp.co.jp/article/Watcher/20110513/360312/?ST=cio&P=1
Resources:-
From the recent survey about social media executed to people representing innovators and early adaptors of IT and social media in Japan, it can be said that social media is spreading in Japan although mostly as private use. Business use will surely start to spread in the future as well, which requires individuals to improve their social media literacy and companies/organizations to develop guidelines, develop and roll out strategy, all with understanding that correct use of social media with commitment would be beneficial to them.
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