Five things you need to know about mobile marketing in Japan

1. The mobile landscape.

There are over 110 million mobile subscribers across three mobile network operators in Japan, and over 80 per cent of subscribers use mobile data services. This translates to a whopping three quarters of the country's population. Even taking out users who only use the data capacity for messaging, it leaves nearly 70 million mobile internet users. With less than three per cent of global mobile subscribers, mobile internet penetration is more than double any European country and that of the US. Estimates of mobile advertising spending in Japan are as high as 38 per cent of the total global figure.

2. User experience.

The Japanese certainly love their mobile technology and embrace it faster than any other country. Over 95 per cent of subscribers are on a 3G handset – the highest penetration in the world. The quality of the network and the coverage is exceptional and this leads to an unparalleled user experience. As 75 per cent of users are on a flat-rate data plan, advertisers are not afraid to utilise data-intensive sites and applications, allowing for highly creative and innovative marketing campaigns all delivered into the hands of their target consumers.

3. Content rich environment.

All mobile network operators in Japan follow an open platform strategy. Staying out of the content business themselves, and offering content providers a pay out of around 90 per cent of the revenue, has resulted in a plethora of easily accessible mobile sites and a consumer that is not suffering from any cost barrier when downloading content rich media.

A downside is that media planners do have a hard time to target across all three carriers and the thousands of sites available. Marketers of large brands in Japan also tend to be of a different generation to the users, and there still is a big gap in knowledge and realisation of the potential of mobile content and marketing for some of the best known brands in Japan.

Educating brand owners by advertising agencies is the key to success – unfortunately while TV media still generates huge profits for the key advertising giants in Japan, a next big wave of content and advertising campaigns is a little ways away.

4. Device fragmentation.

The mobile network operators hold the keys to the kingdom in Japan. They define the device specs they require for their different lines of handsets and the device manufacturers make to order – of course at their own risk. The beauty for the consumer is that with three mobile phone operators with very similar functionality, developers and marketers rarely have to worry about device fragmentation and usability across the networks. This has significantly contributed to high consumer adoption of mobile data services.

5. Just plain 'funky'.

Japanese love convenience and have a lot of idle time (thanks to long train commutes). The more ways they can utilise their pocket-size, personal device, the more they love using them. We see mobile handsets used for everything from SNS to electronic payments, from navigation to video-on-demand, and of course calling.

The average 16 to 24 year-old is spending at least one hour a day on web usage on their phones, and this is still early days in Japan!

*Statistics and insights credited to research done by Christopher Billich, one of the most knowledgeable experts on mobile marketing in the world.