Guide to Influencer Marketing in Japan

Getting your products or services noticed by a specific audience can be a challenge, even more so when you are a non-Japanese company trying to break into the Japanese market. Influencer marketing can be one of the most effective ways to do so without spending as much as you would on, for example, a regular TV commercial or other types of marketing. Getting your products noticed by the target audience via influencer marketing is gaining popularity fast in Japan and it could turn out to be part of your golden marketing formula for Japan. But which points do you need to keep in mind when you turn to influencer marketing in Japan?

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Why Turn to Influencer Marketing

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With the use of influencer marketing having seen exponential growth worldwide since 2016, marketers everywhere have started to realize the potential of this type of brand promotion. Indeed, influencer marketing is a very powerful tool in getting your brand to the attention of those who are actually interested in it. People follow influencers who talk about subjects they naturally have an interest in, and influencers choose collaborations that suit their image, specialties, and narratives. Followers see influencers as a respectable source of information and are likely to trust influencers’ opinions. 

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With raising brand awareness being one of the top reasons to turn to influencer marketing, this form of marketing is one of the most logical choices for companies trying to get their brand noticed in a market that is new to them. In Japan, this is even more true because gaining the trust of Japanese audiences is one of the most challenging aspects of entering the Japanese market as a foreign company.

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Japanese Influencer Trends

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Influencer marketing in Japan has gotten a boost in general when Apple’s iOS 14.5 update made paid social marketing much more difficult. Because of this update, ways to target audiences significantly decreased and influencer marketing became the most surefire way to find the audiences you are looking for. This sparked a much greater interest in influencer marketing, even from companies who formerly eschewed it in favor of performance marketing.

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Because Japan has a collectivist culture, it is not so surprising that collaborations between influencers are not only acceptable but popular. Brands can enjoy a significantly wider scoop when the influencer they work with starts a collaboration with a different influencer in an overlapping niche. Instagram has a relatively new ‘Add Yours’ sticker that can boost story engagement with a simple button click, and influencers in Japan are happy to use it.

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A trend where influencers started using live streams via platforms like Twitch and Instagram has caused a rise in live social shopping, or live commerce. In this form of commercial, an influencer does a product demonstration or review through a live stream session during which viewers can ask questions and have them answered right away. Japanese consumers love to get a very detailed look at products including plenty of close-ups so they can really get a feel for what it would be like to use a product. Live streams lend themselves perfectly for satisfying this fondness for the ‘komakai’ details.

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Influencer Marketing in Japan VS Other Countries

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Differences between Japanese culture and a company’s base country’s culture has its effects on what makes for productive content and likely outcomes. There are a few ‘rules’ you need to play by if you want to make the most of your influencer marketing campaign in Japan. 

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• Platform use: the popularity of YouTube for especially younger male influencers is very large in Japan. Women can be mainly found on Instagram, and if you want to gather brand awareness among Gen Z TikTok is the way to go. It is good to note that TikTok is very much used to simply relax and not so much for spending money. For subcultures, Twitch is a popular medium
• Cultural differences: the way privacy is valued in Japan has effects on how influencer marketing works here, with many influencers not appearing prominently in their images and sometimes even being anonymous. The way products are promoted is also deeply affected by cultural concepts and you will find interesting new ways to get products and services to potential customers’ attention like influencers working hard (‘ganbaru’) alongside a product
• Language: the language doesn’t only affect the ease of communication, it also makes important parts of your campaign such as finding the most effective hashtags more challenging. New words pop up regularly in Japan, especially in the katakana realm, and knowing which (trending) hashtags to use for your product or service can be very beneficial to your campaign
• Meaning of numbers: Japanese people are not as likely to dish out comments and likes as such an endorsement reflects strongly on their public image. That is why even lower engagement numbers don’t have to mean an influencer campaign didn’t have any effects. The number of followers may also be lower than what you are used to, but the quality of those followers is higher as they are more likely to be true fans of the influencer and their niche
• Large agency contracts: famous influencers are in almost every case contractually bound to large agencies who gatekeep who gets to work with them. They are also very expensive to use, so working with very large influencers is out of reach for most companies

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If you don’t have the million-dollar budget to work with famous influencers, are not bilingual, or don’t have any experience working with Japanese influencers, partnering with a boutique influencer agency can make your marketing efforts much easier and more effective.

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Hiring a Boutique Influencer Agency in Japan?

The largest challenges in working with Japanese influencers are identifying fitting influencers, overcoming the language and cultural barriers, and gaining the trust of influencers that catch your eye. If you hire a bilingual and bicultural agency in Japan, much of these challenges are easily overcome. The agency can find influencers that suit your campaign in their database, facilitate the communication between the client and the influencer(s) and the client and potential customers, and advice on the content of campaigns that are likely to work well with Japanese audiences.

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Not having to search for influencers yourself without knowing the market well and contacting them without hearing back from the majority will save you a lot of frustration and time. If you want to take full advantage from the large Japanese market could yield, working through a Japanese influencer agency is a big step in that direction.

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