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Japan is often the first Asian market companies
in the U.S. and Europe look to in Asia for sales
and marketing. A long history of stable relationships
with Western countries, a relatively affluent population,
and excellent trade relations make Japan an attractive
market for companies looking to enter Asia. Japan,
however, requires careful planning and can pose
a substantial localization challenge for companies
without experience in the country.
Japanese was for many years considered one of the
most technically difficult target languages for
localization, and as a result, Japanese localization
services commanded a premium price. Although Japanese
no longer poses a major technical challenge due
to substantial improvements in support for the language
in computer operating systems and applications,
Japanese localization still has plenty of challenges
to consider.
The first is that the Japanese writing system really
consists of four separate writing systems, all of
which must be used in most localized documents.
The first writing system consists of kanji or Chinese
characters, which are used to represent the roots
of most Japanese words. These characters are borrowed
versions of characters originally developed in China.
Although they are very similar to current traditional
Chinese characters in most instances, they are often
not identical. To further complicate matters, most
characters have a minimum of two different readings:
one that expresses the meaning of the character
in Japanese and one that reflects the sound of the
Chinese character.
The second and third writing systems are sometimes
called, collectively, kana. The first sort of kana
is called hiragana. Hiragana characters represent
syllables of the Japanese language and are used
to write grammatical endings after kanji roots.
The second sort of kana is called katakana. Like
hiragana, katakana represents syllables in the language,
but is generally reserved to write foreign words
or to accentuate words. In general, katakana has
a blockier, more angular appearance than hiragana.
Both forms of kana were originally developed from
Chinese characters over 1,000 years ago, but now
bear little resemblance to the Chinese characters
from which they are derived.
The fourth writing system is romaji or Roman characters
(Roman characters are those used to write English,
among other languages). Romaji are used to write
out some foreign words and are often used for brand
names and other bits of text that are not part of
the “normal” Japanese language. Although
romaji are the same letters used in English, they
often are designed to go with Japanese fonts and
have a look quite different from regular Western
fonts.
Any software or systems localized for Japanese
must allow for the use of all four writing systems
in any Japanese text. Although either form of kana
or romaji can be used to write out the sounds of
Japanese, Japanese text makes use of all four, often
within a single sentence, and there is no substitute
for support for the writing systems.
In addition to the complexity of writing systems,
Japanese can be written in two orientations: vertical
and horizontal. Japanese was traditionally written
vertically top to bottom, with lines arranged right
to left. Today it is often written in horizontal
lines running left to right and top to bottom. Literary
texts, newspapers and many other texts are still
written vertically, and require that the binding
edge of books be on the left (making Japanese books
look “backwards” to westerners). Technical
texts are more typically written in the horizontal
orientation and thus appear to be in the right order
to westerners. For most localizations, the horizontal
orientation is sufficient.
A more substantial difficulty in localization is
that Japanese writing follows a very different style
than western writing. The differences are so substantial
that very good Japanese writing translated fairly
literally into European languages and vice versa
may be quite difficult to understand. As a result,
many Japanese companies create two original versions
of documentation: one in Japanese for the domestic
Japanese market and one in English that is translated
for other markets. While most western companies
are unlikely to author a separate Japanese version
of documentation, be prepared for Japanese localizations
from Europe source-language texts to require substantially
more work and revision than localizations into European
languages. Native-language reviewers (either in-country
or with very recent in-country experience) are an
absolute requirement. Keep in mind that Japanese
readers are used to high quality and have a high
demand for quality in products and documentation.
Although they will tolerate badly-localized materials,
spending a bit extra on localization to ensure a
quality result will almost certainly be worth it
in the long run.
If you are preparing documents to be localized
into Japanese, there are a number of steps you can
take to help ensure quality localization. These
steps are generally easy to take, if carried out
while documents are being authored, but more difficult
to carry out later.
The first step is that you should avoid using typographic
formatting (bold, italics, underlining, etc.) to
convey important information in your documents.
Japanese does not have italics, and accomplishes
the various functions of italics in English (e.g.,
emphasis, marking titles, quotes, etc.) in other
ways. Even where formatting options appear similar
(most Japanese fonts have bold versions, for instance),
the meaning may be subtly different. If your documents
use styles, you would be wise to consistently use
them and to make sure that your localization partners
understand the function of each style in the text
so that they can select appropriate Japanese formatting.
Although the styling of text can convey important
information, be aware that Japanese text will often
be styled very differently in Japanese.
The second step is to make sure that any name or
address forms or fields will accept Japanese data.
Japanese names are written with the family name
first, and any software applications must allow
for family names to be written first. In addition,
Japanese address formats must include the prefecture,
city, district, block number and house number for
any building. Standard address fields developed
for the U.S. will not work well for Japanese addresses.
The third step is to allow extra localization time
for Japan and to talk to your localization service
providers early on about your goals with Japanese
localization so that they can tailor their services
to meet your needs. A simple technical bulletin
will require very different services than marketing
collateral, and you should make sure that your partners
understand your requirements and are prepared to
meet them.
Finally, when entering the Japanese market, make
sure that you select both localization service providers
and local partners with extensive experience in
the Japanese market. Business in Japan, more so
than business in Europe or the U.S., is driven by
personal relationships. Be prepared to travel to
Japan and spend time with local distributors. Make
sure to have experienced business interpreters in
any negotiation situations and make the effort to
conduct business in Japanese where possible.
With proper preparation and understanding of local-market
needs, Japan does not have to be a terribly difficult
target locale. It does, however, require extra time
and expertise to properly prepare products for Japanese
market entry.
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