A rich culture of diversity in Japan
Yayoi, a 24-year-old who works in an office at a Japanese company, is obsessed with stars. In a homemade video, she shows off her star candles, a star barrette and even an ear cleaner adorned with a star charm.
"Stars make me feel happy, because I feel as though their radiance is somehow transferred to me," she says earnestly to the camera. And then: "When it comes to stars, money is no object."
Some might say Yayoi's star fetish borders on monomania, but in Japan there is a name for such a product fanatic: otaku. Increasingly, these individuals are regarded as a normal - if not necessary - component of Japan's cultural fabric.
Advertisers and marketers are waking up to the swathes of young people in Japan who belong to "tribes" or sub-cultures and have a great deal of money to spend on items they feel help define their lifestyle.
"Fourteen years ago when I started giving presentations about otaku, it was written up at that time in the Japanese press as possibly the greatest threat to society ever known," says David McCaughan, director of strategic planning at McCann-Erickson in Tokyo.
"These were weird, obsessed kids who spent hours each day researching one subject on their computers. Well, we now call that normal."
McCann-Erickson, the global advertising giant, has launched a specialist communications service called Tag Tokyo. The Tag format was first established by McCann in New York last year, and targets the youth market of 18-28-year-olds.
"It's not easy to understand today's complex youth only through regular group interviews," says Yutaka Tsuda, a twenty-something Tag Tokyo strategic planner with coiffed hair and baggy clothes, part of the 10-strong Tokyo Tag team.
"Tsuda-san used to look just like me before he joined Tag," says the suit-wearing Mr McCaughan.
Tag Tokyo gathers market data on young people using innovative tools that are unusual in Japan. Yayoi, the star-infatuated young woman, was videoed via a Tag tool called "Everybody is Ken Burns", after the documentary film-maker. They hand video cameras to "targets", who then make an uncensored video of his or her life.
Other tools include "Snap n Send", where data is collected by sending questions via a mobile phone equipped with a camera, and collecting the answers - often as a hybrid of text and photos.
Japan has become a hotbed for youth trends that influence pop culture and young people throughout the world. In addition, there have been important structural shifts in the youth market, says McCann-Erickson.
"We recognised that youth culture in Japan had come to a point where it had changed so much. The market has become more fractionalised," says Mr McCaughan.
A recession in Japan lasting more than a decade has been the catalyst for much of the change and segmentation in the youth market, say industry observers. The bursting of Japan's asset bubble and subsequent breakdown of the lifetime employment system has given rise to a category of young adults dubbed freeters in the media.
Freeters may or may not have attended college but they do hold down a number of part-time jobs while pursuing their dreams - whether as a guitarist in a punk band or studying to be a beautician.
"Niche consumption patterns have emerged in the Japanese market," says Futaba Tanaka, a chief researcher at Hakuhodo, a leading Japanese advertising agency, and author of the book Live Marketing.
"A decade ago, young people coveted the same things. But now, the Japanese have more sophisticated patterns of collecting information, such as PCs and mobile phones. This provides the basic infrastructure by which one can gather information and pinpoint what they want."
Indeed, many observers say the young Japanese may be the most sophisticated in the world when it comes to quickly cataloguing their items of desire, whether it be by researching on a computer or by flicking through the myriad magazines at their local convenience store.
"The editing capability of Japanese youth is phenomenal," says Junko Yuasa, an expert on youth marketing in the cosmetics product development unit at Shiseido, Japan's leading cosmetics company. "Japanese women are not particularly creative, but they're excellent at editing, or creating a look from seemingly disparate pieces or styles."
Shiseido last year launched a new cosmetics line, Majolica Majorca, which caters to women in the 19-24 age bracket.
Most advertisers are focusing less on teenagers and more on those in their early 20s: young, single people who are working. According to the Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living, the research arm of the advertising agency, in 2002 men aged 15-19 had Y15,940 to spend freely, while those in their 20s had an average of Y51,370. In comparison, women aged 15-19 had Y16,600 in disposable income, and those in their 20s had Y38,300. "It's our intention to capture those who are making money," says Ms Yuasa.
Another change that has slowly gained momentum in Japan is a declining fixation on US-branded products, and the west in general.
"From the post-war era to the end of the bubble, Japanese youth have long been transfixed on overseas goods," says Ms Tanaka from Hakuhodo. "But with the rise of J-pop [Japanese pop music] and Japanese street fashion, people are waking up to the quality and coolness of domestic goods."
With the country's population falling (the average number of children a woman will have dropped to a record low of 1.29 in 2003), many agencies are strengthening their market research on the "silver market".
Dentsu, Japan's leading adverting agency, established a "50+ project" in 2001, which gathered marketing, media planning and media buying experts to study the senior consumer segment. The project developed into a separate department of more than 40 staff. In contrast, Dentsu researches the youth market, but does not have a dedicated department.
But some observers say the greying of Japan could increase the purchasing power of the young. "Most people think that from 2007, when the population begins to shrink, it will become a difficult time for anyone selling stuff to young people," says Mr McCaughan.
"But I say it's boom time for selling stuff to young people. A shrinking population means there will be more adults per young person. So there will be more pockets for that young person's hands to get into."
锁定日本“族群”文化市场
弥生(Yayoi)今年24岁，在一家日本企业的办公室工作，平时着迷于星星。在一段自拍的录像中，她向人们展示了她的星星蜡烛，一枚星星发夹，甚至还有一个装有星饰的挖耳勺。
“星星让我觉得幸福，因为我好像感到它们的光辉不知怎么地也传递到了我身上，”她对着相机真诚地说道，“一碰到星星，钱就无所谓了。”
有人可能会认为，弥生对星星的迷恋已近于偏执，但在日本，对于这种某一产品的极端爱好者有一个专门的词：御宅族(otaku)。人们日益把这些人视为日本文化结构中正常的组成部分，如果不是必要组成部分的话。
广告商和营销人员正意识到日本青年的这种自我包装，这些人属于某些“族群”或亚文化，并有大把的钱花在他们感到能帮助他们定位自身风格的小东西上。
“十四年前，当我刚开始向人们做有关御宅族的演示时，日本的媒体当时把他们写成是有史以来或许对日本社会最大的威胁，”东京(McCann-Erickson)麦肯广告公司策略部主管大卫?麦可汉(David McCaughan)说道。
“他们是一些古怪痴迷的孩子，每天花好几个小时在电脑上查询一个话题。而我们现在把这个看得很正常。”
作为全球广告行业的巨擘，麦肯推出了一项名为“东京挂件”(Tag Tokyo)的专业沟通服务。挂件的格式由麦肯纽约公司于去年设定，以18岁至28岁的青年市场为目标对象。
“只通过一般的群体访谈是很难理解当今复杂的年轻人的，”20来岁的策略策划人津田丰(Yutaka Tsuda)说道。扎着头巾，衣着松松垮垮的津田丰是东京挂件小组的10名成员之一。
“津田君在加入挂件小组之前，看上去就和我一样，”西装笔挺的麦可汉先生说。
东京挂件使用创新的工具来收集有关年轻人的市场数据，这些工具在日本很不寻常。他们以纪录片导演肯?伯恩斯(Ken Burns)的名字，给年轻的星星迷弥生用于录像的挂件工具命名，称之为“人人都是肯?伯恩斯”。他们把摄像机交给“目标对象”，由其拍摄不经剪辑的个人生活。
其它工具包括“即拍即发”(Snap n Send)，这一工具的数据是由通过带照相功能的手机发送问题并回收答案来收集的，它们往往夹杂着文字和照片。
日本已经成为年轻时尚的温床，影响着全世界的流行文化和青年人。此外，麦肯广告公司认为，青年市场已经发生重要的结构转型。
“我们意识到，日本青年的文化已经有了巨大的变化。这一市场越来越分众化，”麦可汉先生讲道。
业界观察家认为，日本持续了十多年的经济衰退在很大程度上是这种变化和分裂的催化剂。日本资产泡沫的破灭及终身雇用制紧随其后的崩溃促成了一类年轻成人的形成，媒体把他们称为“自由打工族”(freeters)。
自由打工族或许上过大学，也可能没上过，但在追求梦想的同时，不管这一梦想是成为朋克乐队的吉他手，还是学做美容师，他们确实都捏着好几份兼职工作。
日本著名的博报堂广告公司(Hakuhodo)的首席研究员田中双叶（Futaba Tanaka）认为，“日本市场已经浮现出夹缝消费模式。” 田中女士还是《营销实况》(Live Marketing)一书的作者。
“十年前，年轻人垂涎同样的东西。但现在，日本人有了更成熟的信息收集方式，如个人电脑和手机。这给人们提供了基本的设备来搜集信息并挑选他们想要的内容。”
确实，许多观察家认为，就迅速编列心仪物件来说，日本的年轻人可能是世界上最成熟的，不管是通过在计算机上查询，还是翻阅便利店中无数的杂志。
“日本青年的编辑能力非凡，”日本著名的化妆品企业资生堂(Shiseido)化妆品发展部的年轻人市场专家汤浅淳子（Junko Yuasa）说道，“日本女性并不特别有创意，但她们是编辑的高手，或是善于从一些看似零零落落的东西或风格中创造出形象。”
资生堂去年推出了一个新的化妆品系列――“恋爱魔镜”(Majolica Majorca)，专门迎合19岁至24岁的女性。
大多数广告商更关注20岁出头的群体，而不是十几岁的青少年，他们年轻、单身，有工作。博报堂广告公司的研究部门――生命生活研究所(Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living)发现，在2002年，15岁至19岁的男性有1.594万日元可供自由支配，20多岁的男性平均有5.137万日元。相比之下，15岁至19岁的女性有1.66万可供自由支配的收入，20多岁的女性有3.83万日元。“我们的目的是要掌握那些挣钱的人，” 汤浅女士说道。
另一个在日本慢慢获得动力的变化是，只盯住美国品牌的现象正逐渐消失，西方产品普遍如此。
“从战后到经济泡沫结束，日本青年一直迷恋于海外产品，”博报堂的田中女士说，“但随着日本流行音乐和街头文化的崛起，人们开始意识到本地产品的质量和帅气。”
随着该国人口的下降(2003年，每位妇女将有的孩子的平均数降到了1.29的历史低点)，许多广告公司正加强有关“银发市场”的市场调研。
2001年，日本著名的电通广告公司(Dentsu)建立了一个“50岁以上的项目”，该项目汇集了营销、媒介计划和媒介购买专家来研究老年消费者群体。它发展成一个拥有40多名员工的独立部门。对比之下，电通虽然也研究年轻人市场，却没有专设一个部门。
但一些观察家认为，日本老龄化可能使年轻人的购买力有所增长。“大多数人认为，对那些向年轻人销售东西的人来说，从2007年日本人口开始萎缩起，将是一个困难的时期，”麦可汉先生说道。
“但我却认为那会是向年轻人销售东西的繁荣期。人口的缩减意味着每个年轻人将有更多的成人(长辈)。因此年轻人将有更多的口袋可掏。”
