Android and iOS Success: A Two-Way Traffic for Japanese Mobile Apps
For developers who want to enter the Japanese market, Android and iOS apps provide an easier entry point. Similarly, Japanese app developers are also seeking to enter the worldwide market through the same channels. This is one example of a true world market with a central repository.
Apps which easily come to mind are those for established browser based apps like Dropbox, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Seismic and Facebook. Another app which has crossed borders with great success is Angry Birds.
Entering the Japanese mobile app market is not that easy for foreign app developers. Besides the fragmented nature of the market with lots of feature phone brands, there is also the matter of a portal or platform. The fragmented market is daunting because developers have to alter apps for each feature phone.
Sales reports for 2012 indicate that iOS and Android now account for the majority of sales in smartphones. That leaves the app developers with only the slight problem of localization and culturization for the Japanese market, which is a totally different concern.
Additionally, app developers who want to get into the Japanese market may skip the need for a Japanese mobile app portal like GREE and DeNA. They can instead rely on traditional strategies for marketing: social media and word of mouth. In Japan, companies like GREE and DeNA do the same work for apps as Google Play and App Store, promoting and running these in the same manner as Facebook and Twitter. They will dominate for the foreseeable future.
The success of these companies can be seen in the way they monetize mobile apps. Japan is the second largest market for app monetization, and third in app download volume.
Japanese game and app developers can also use Google Play and App Store to sell their products. Coming from a very competitive marketing culture famous for being persistent and patient, Japanese app developers are prepared to wait until the rest of the world starts to appreciate their style.
Entering Japan is not a simple matter of placing an app on App Store and Google Play. There is still the matter of support, and a cloud hosting service is required to deal with variable customer throughput. Getting into the Japanese market just got easier, but app developers need all the help they can get from culturization and localization specialists.
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About the Guest Author:
Rodolfo Lentejas, Jr. is a fulltime freelance writer based in Toronto. He is the founder of the PostSckrippt, a growing online writing business dedicated to producing top quality, original and fresh content. To know more about him, please visit www.postsckrippt.ca. Like him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter, Google+ and Pinterest.
