Why X (formerly Twitter) is a great platform for market research in Japan (2024)

Gathering Information from social media

Social media has become an essential tool for content marketing. According to a report by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications in Japan, the percentage of companies and individuals using social media is on the rise. This presents any marketeer with a research opportunity that is representative.

Social media is used to create and maintain connections between individuals. But compared to the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom, it is reported that more people in Japan use social media for the purpose of “information gathering”, rather than for connecting with people.

Number of active users and active user demographics

With 330 million monthly active users worldwide and 69.28 million in Japan, it continues to enjoy strong popularity in Japan. In fact, Japan has the second-highest user base, after United States.

Although Twitter is mainly used amongst the younger generation, there is an increasing number of users in their 30s and 40s. As well as this, the gap between men and women is reducing as the number of female users increases. There is now a large and rich domain for doing local research on Twitter. This is why Twitter is a key platform for social listening, allowing you to understand the Japanese market more than ever before. 

As a content marketing agency that helps international companies stepping into the Japanese market, we often recommend social listening. Doing it on Twitter, helps you to understand its uniqueness, consumer preferences, as well as local competitors.

Unique usage of X (Twitter)

A unique trait to Twitter users in Japan is that few people use it under their real names. Many accounts are anonymous. As a result of this, tweets tend to show their true feelings, which may be about a product or service. Also in Japan, where natural disasters are common, it is used as a means of sharing information in real-time when an event occurs.

Twitter in Japan

Twitter’s functions are more or less the same in all countries. But you can find some unique differences in Japan. The character limit is 280 for alphabetical languages, but in Japanese, you can type up to 140 characters. This is because each Japanese character is counted as a double-byte. Japanese also has 3 unique writing systems. People use Chinese characters called kanji and one kanji character has meaning. “愛” means “love” and “絵” means “picture”. So when you use twitter for local research, you need to understand the differences well. Especially when you are setting up keywords for research.

A Twitter example

In Japan, many people have multiple accounts, usually one for private use and one for work. Some of them are influencers with vast numbers of followers and engagements.

Then most businesses also have twitter pages. The ones that do well interact with their followers and take advantage of Twitter’s unique connections. 

An example of a successful business account is SHARP. They changed their profile to reflect the human need at the time. They supported social distancing by putting spaces between the characters in the profile which became a hot topic among followers.

While there are notable examples of B2C use, there are also B2B companies, such as Husehatu Industries, that post tweets specific to the content of their products, successfully reaching out to the general audience and gaining general followers.

As you can see, Twitter in Japan is an effective tool for B2C products and services, especially those targeting the younger generation. As well as this you can use Twitter to understand a wide range of opinions and to connect with your audience.