Most university graduates start work in Japan on or around the first of April, so this survey from Macromill Inc interviewed the fresh faces who had been at their companies for just over a month to learn about then new members of society’s opinions.
Demographics
On the 12th and 13th of May 2009 516 members of the Macromill monitor group who were born in 1986 or 1987 and had found a job completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female.
Wow, there’s a lot of very good information in this survey, and I could easily spend the next day or two drawing conclusions! Note in Q3SQ2 the points of dissatisfaction for women, suggesting that even after just a month in the job, gender discrimination is already obvious to them. On the other hand, in Q5 one in eight women plan to quit when they get married, and then another quarter after they have a baby.
In Q7, I hate drinking sessions at work and would probably choose all the reasons listed, except that it’s talking shop all the time that irritates me, not not talking shop as asked! Read the rest of this entry »
I’m sure most of us who have worked in Japan have experienced a colleague sleeping during meetings, so to try to put some concrete numbers on the phenomenon iShare conducted a survey into sleeping at work.
Demographics
Between the 28th of April and the 7th of May 2009 405 members of the CLUB BBQ free email forwarding service completed a private mobile-phone internet-based questionnaire. 54.3% of the sample were male, 32.3% in their twenties, 32.6% in their thirties, and 35.1% in their forties.
Power-napping, catching 15 minutes of forty winks during lunch break, does have definite benefits, and indeed napping salons have started popping up recently, although I do suspect that due to the short night-time sleep hours the Japanese power-nap is more of a necessity than a lifestyle choice.
I don’t power-nap as I use lunch as an opportunity to prepare articles for WJT, but I keep thinking I should. However, my desk is not sleep-friendly and we don’t have any relaxation space in the office. Read the rest of this entry »
Recently, DIMSDRIVE Research took a look at the matter of moving house.
Demographics
Between the 25th of February and the 12th of March 2009 10,789 members of the DIMSDRIVE Monitor group completed a private online questionnaire. 50.5% of the sample were female, 0.8% in their teens, 13.3% in their twenties, 33.6% in their thirties, 30.7% in their forties, 15.2% in their fifties, and 6.4% aged sixty or older.
I’ve got a lot of tales about removals in Japan! The last time I was involved in one was when my parents-in-law moved; my wife organised lots of quotes through the internet, but her father accepted the first one he got, as they gave him a free kilo of rice, even though the company has a less than stellar reputation.
On the day of the removals they brought only two, not three staff to do the packing, the pick-up was delayed, so instead of arriving at the new place at 4pm as promised, it was 10pm, so tradesmen we’d asked to come in to fit the air conditioners, etc, had to go home and come back the next day. To cap it all off, there was some sort of get-out clause in the contract so we couldn’t claim any compensation off them. Read the rest of this entry »
Apparently there is quite a sub-culture of pen collectors in Japan, but that was not one of the issues investiged by MyVoice when they looked at stationery.
Demographics
Over the first five days of April 2009 15,602 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private online 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.
It seems that in nearly every restaurant I go to that requires credit card signatures and has a woman on the till, said woman will have a cute pen decorated with Hello Kitty or the like, often complete with a dangly mascot. For my part I rarely buy stationery, with the last one being a stick of glue in a 100 yen shop last year. Most of my work pens are from work or freebies from conferences.
Oh, and I’ve never really got the appeal of four-colour pens; I grew out of them early into secondary school, yet half my office seems to have them and use them regularly.
There’s nothing terribly graphable in this survey, so instead lets have an advertisement for pens:
MyVoice recently conducted a survey into online shopping usage, the sixth time they have looked at this topic. The results of this survey are very relevant to anyone trying to sell stuff in the Japanese market.
Demographics
Over the first five days of April 2009 15,665 members of the MyVoice internet community completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% int heir teens, 15% in their twenties, 35% in their thirties, 30% in their forties, and 18% aged fifty or older.
The numbers below are much higher than I would have expected! It’s a surprise to me that books are the top item bought – there’s very little discounting on Amazon Japan and there’s no shortage of physical book stores so I feel the online benefit is marginal in Japan, but obviously my gut feeling is wrong.
In Q2SQ4, I’m surprised they didn’t have a specific answer for a text link through a blog, as when I buy stuff it’s usually after a search for reviews then an affiliate click-through from a blog. Read the rest of this entry »
This is not quite as entertaining a FAIL as yesterday’s post, but this report from japan.internet.com on a survey conducted by iBridge Research Plus into electronic mail focused at failures in the office with BCC, Blind Carbon Copy.
Demographics
On the first of May 2009 300 members of the iBridge monitor panel completed a private intenet-based questionnaire. 55.3% of the sample were male, 13.0% in their twenties, 35.7% in their thirties, 39.7% in their forties, 8.7% in their fifties, and 3.0% in their sixties.
I can’t recall ever making a mistake with BCC, a feature I rarely use anyway, but I have been on the receiving end of huge To lists that would have been better handled with BCC.
One very useful number came out of this recent survey from goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com into internet advertising, their fifth regular survey on this subject, how often advertisements in search results catch people’s eyes. You may use the third regular survey as a cross-reference.
Demographics
Between the 20th and 23rd of April 2009 1,071 members of the goo Research monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 52.9% of the sample were male, 16.1% in their teens, 18.3% in their twenties, 21.6% in their thirties, 16.3% in their forties, and 27.7% aged fifty or older.
I think Q1SQ2 is a bit of a confusing result – only 14.8% of adverisement clickers have purchased items, but not all advertisements are selling things, and even advertisements that are are often not directly selling.
A new-to-me blog for the NPO Japan for Sustainability recently published the results of a survey into awareness of Fairtrade that showed a quite surprising to me 17.6% who both knew the term, and knew it was concerned with poverty and the environment. In Japanese it is merely a transliteration of the English word, not a translation, and I have never seen the Fairtrade mark appearing on Japanese products, so I must say I am a bit skeptical of these numbers, even though the survey was conducted by the reputable firm Macromill Inc.
Demographics
Betwen the 10th and 26th of February 2009 11,961 members of the DIMSDRIVE Monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. 50.1% of the sample were male, 1.0% in their teens, 12.6% in their twenties, 33.2% in their thirties, 31.0% in their forties, 15.3% in their fifties, and 6.9% aged sixty or older. Note that since this is a PC internet-based online survey, there will be a bit of bias in the sample towards higher-earning households.
“Foreigners can’t get credit cards” is one of the most popular fallacies in Japan. It is true that foreigners, especially those younger, working on jobs with yearly contracts, and with no credit history in Japan do find it difficult, if not impossible, to get one, but there is no credible evidence of systematic discrimination against foreigners, as my walletful of Japanese plastic will attest to. I have experienced anomalies, however, such as when both my wife and I applied for a UFJ card, the bank that provides my mortgage and that I pay my salary into, and she got four times the credit limit that I got, despite zero salary!
The latest credit card I got was a Toho Cinema’s MasterCard, which is good value if you’re a regular cinema goer – six visits and you get the seventh visit free, and even discount tickets bought elsewhere count toward the six movies, and their online booking system is very smooth and bilingual.
Regarding Q3 and few being interested in card design, I actually cancelled a card because they stopped putting Miffy on the front… I also want to get a loud Hello Kitty card just to use abroad!
Have you ever been refused for a Japanese credit card?
This survey from MyVoice, their second look at department stores, had a surprising to me set of results, with Japanese much less frequent users of these stores than I might have imagined.
Demographics
Over the first five days of March 2009 15,606 members of the MyVoice internet community successfully completed a private online questionnaire. 54% of the sample were female, 2% in their teens, 14% in their twenties, 36% in their thirties, 29% in their forties, and 19% aged fifty or older.
I recommend to every visitor to Japan that they go to department stores to at least just look; the basement floor is usually full of lots of speciality food stores that will be more than happy to hand out free samples at off-peak times. The best one I know for this is Hanshin Umeda – there’s always lots of free mouthfuls of wine, sake, fruit vinegar and tea to be had.
I quite often use these food areas, in particular RF1, which although a little on the expensive side has a wonderful range of salads. My favourites are their baked veggies – lots of potato, asparagus and carrot – and their Hokkaido Danshaku potato croquette, which are wonderfully soft and creamy. Read the rest of this entry »
Most university graduates start work in Japan on or around the first of April, so this survey from Macromill Inc interviewed the fresh faces who had been at their companies for just over a month to learn about then new members of society’s opinions.
I’m sure most of us who have worked in Japan have experienced a colleague sleeping during meetings, so to try to put some concrete numbers on the phenomenon iShare conducted a survey into 
Recently, DIMSDRIVE Research took a look at the matter of 
MyVoice recently conducted a survey into 
This is not quite as entertaining a FAIL as 
One very useful number came out of this recent survey from goo Research and reported on by japan.internet.com into 
This is a 
This survey from MyVoice, their second look at 
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