I’ve just come back from a trip to Nippon Koku and Japan feels as much like the land of the rising currency as the Land of the Rising Sun, with the US dollar now at 85 Yen. While in Tokyo, I visited a whole bunch of public relations/social media agencies (as well as squeezing in a walk around the Ginza, a sushi lunch, and enjoying some sake with a friend).
The feedback from the people I met was universal – the combination of the recession and the fluctuation in the currency had put a real damper on international business activities, and also put Japanese exports under pressure as their relative prices increased around the world. The senior agency executives I met were cautiously optimistic about the mid-term prospects of the communications industry. Some pointed to the on-going economic importance of Japan as the world’s second largest market, and others looked to the burgeoning social media and digital marketing scene as a new way forward for communications professionals.
In 2009, Japanese Internet users spent a total of 887 billion minutes online. Furthermore, the Japanese internet is exceptionally mobile, with 75 million people accessing the web via hand-held devices. Search is huge, as is gaming. Marketers are getting increasingly sophisticated about using mobile, and weaving it into integrated on- and off-line campaigns.
Whether it is for on- or off-line work, and whatever the economic conditions, here at Bite we see a continuous stream of client interest in Japan as a standalone market, or as an important part of an Asia Pacific strategy. Below, courtesy of Caroline Kawashima in our Bite San Francisco office, are some tips on how to engage and work with a public relations firm in Japan:
- Retaining an agency in Japan can seem expensive by international standards. The US$/Yen exchange rate and the relatively high costs of doing business in Tokyo mean that a baseline investment of around $10,000 per month is required.
- Don’t assume that even the multinational agencies will have fully bilingual or fluent English speakers. While the majority of Japanese are competent at reading English, they may not be fluent in spoken English.
- Make sure that you carefully review any firm’s roster of existing clients. It is not uncommon in Japan for marketing and PR agencies to take on competitive clients, particularly at larger firms. That may not be acceptable to some MNC’s.
- You may have more PR “pull” if your brand is also investing in advertising or other marketing in Japan. Large ad budgets tend to curry more favor with the local media.
- Manage your expectations about whether a global campaign can be executed in Japan. Nine times out of ten the local PR agency will advise a customized approach that will achieve the same objectives in Japan but that may be completely different from the approach taken elsewhere (even throughout the rest of Asia-Pacific).
- Think long-term. Results may not be immediate in this market and continual investment over a long period of time may be needed to “move the needle.”