Toluu

世論 What Japan Thinks

From kimono to keitai; research Japanese facts and figures through translated opinion polls and surveys.

Free Nengajou New Year PostcardsToday

No, not a free offer from me, but some research into 年賀状, nengajou, New Year Postcards conducted by iBridge Research Plus and reported on by japan.internet.com looking in particular at both free advertisement-plastered pre-franked postcards and the SNS mixi’s pay service for sending postcards to virtual friends whilst retaining privacy, a process which I wouldn’t be surprised if they have applied for a patent for.

Demographics

On the 25th of November 2008 300 people from the iBridge monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.7% of the sample were female, 14.3% in their twenties, 37.3% in their thirties, 31.7% in their forties, 10.3% in their fifties, and 6.3% in their sixties.

Looking at the web site giving the cards away (too late, the closing date is past!) it’s actually rather a good idea. The cards have the adverts inside the postcard and can be peeled open, otherwise you get an almost completely blank card for you do draw or print on as desired.

I’ve already ordered and r

Over 70% of Japanese households have newspaper subscriptionYesterday

Japan is well-known the world over for being a nation of newspaper readers, so on the surface the headline figure from this survey by DIMSDRIVE Research into newspaper purchase is not too big a surprise. A quick language note - in Japan 新聞, shimbun, is the Japanese for newspaper, which you could probably work out anyway from Q3!

Demographics

Between the 17th of September and the 2nd of October 2008 10,231 members of the DIMSDRIVE monitors completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.8% of the sample were female, 1.2% in their teens, 13.4% in their twenties, 34.2% in their thirties, 30.2% in their forties, 14.8% in their fifties, and 6.2% aged sixty or older. By employement status, the three largest percentages were 40.4% full-time company employees, 20.7% homemakers, and 12.4% part-time or casual labour. By household income, 6.6% earned under 2 million yen per year, 19.8% under 4 million yen, 24.4% under 6 million yen, 15.3% under 8 million yen, 9.6% under 10 million yen, and 10.3% over 10 million yen. 14.0% were not saying or didn’t know.

One way that Japanese newspapers keep their print subscriptions up is to limit the amount they publis

What not to do at your Christmas party!December 3

Well, they are actually called 忘年会, bounenkai, forget the year parties, over here but they serve a similar purpose to said Xmas event. To find out what you shouldn’t do there, goo Ranking had a look at the NG activities at a bounenkai. NG is a commonly-used abbreviation in Japan too, for No Good.

Demographics

Between the 21th and 24th of October 2008 1,056 members of the goo Research online monitor panel completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.5% of the sample were female, 5.0% in their teens, 13.2% in their twenties, 28.4% in their thirties, 31.5% in their forties, 13.1% in their fifties, and 8.8% aged sixty or older. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

Since this is a silly survey, I’ll be a bit freer with the translation today! I also couldn’t be bothered waiting until Sunday to present this.

I hope I can rely on Roaf at Gaijin Tonic to break most of these rules at this year’s bounenkai!

Which reminds me, you can buy drunken salarymen mobile phone charms from Strapya.

Ranking result

Q: What do you think is inexcusable behaviour at bounenkais? (Sample size=1,056)

R

Blog usage habits in JapanDecember 3

As a professional blogger (perhaps) my requirements for a blogging service are very different from the average person, so I do find it a little hard to relate to this survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by Marsh Inc into blogging.

Demographics

Between the 18th and 21st of November 2008 300 members of the Marsh monitor panel completed an internet-based questionnaire. The sample was split 50:50 by sex, and 20.0% were in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

In Q1 I think the amount of people reading commercial blogs is rather low, but I suspect it might be that because people are not seeing the URL as megacorp.com/blog, they assume that places are just hobby blogs, not commercial enterprises.

Most of the Japanese blogs, particularly the personal blogs, make Facebook look tasteful.

Research results

First, from the whole sample the survey reported that 263 people regularly read blogs. However, in the data following it is obvious that the figure was actualy 156, or 52.0%. How many did not even know what a blog is was not reported. These 156 were then asked the following.

Q1: What kinds of blogs do you read? (Sample size=156, multiple answer)

  Votes Percentage Personal blogs 127 81.4% Famous person’s blogs 66 42.3% Friend, family member�

Supermarket own brand shopping in JapanDecember 2

Own brands, or house brands as I think they are known as in the USA, or private brands as they are known in Japan, are the supermarket’s own label items that are sold cheaper than the household brand names. To see what Japan thinks of them, MyVoice performed a survey into own brand products.

Demographics

Over the first five days on November 2008 15,510 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% in their teens, 15% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 18% aged fifty or older.

I try to keep away from own brands in Japan, as I’ve not had very good experiences with them, on the whole. Daiei do fake Kit-Kats, for instance. Their plain ones just don’t have the right chocolate or the crispiness in the wafer, and their flavoured ones are downright nasty!

I think I remember back in the UK there was a web site that listed which own brands were repackaged famous brands; I wonder if such a service exists over here?

Research results

Q1: About how