THE BRIDGE

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Japan’s CyberAgent jumps into market for mothers with crowdsourcing site

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Back in May, CyberAgent announced the launch of a business that would be specifically for mothers here in Japan. This is a natural and smart step for its Ameba platform, considering that many of its top Ameba bloggers are female celebrities with children. Mothers mean business. For mothers, Ameba chose a crowdsourcing website as its first business, calling it Mama & Crowd. Although crowdsourcing is a busy market with existing players like Crowdworks and Lancers, Mama & Crowd will focus on mothers as its work force, and will provide work that doesn’t require such specialized skills — simple jobs like responding to questionnaires or writing short articles fo the web. Mama & Crowd will officially launch in late December, but it already begun its pre-registration on November 19th. Here in Japan, we are seeing more and more apps and services for the mothers demographic. Prima is another example, a flea market mobile app for mothers. The app can be used to sell and buy used clothes and items for kids under 12. The app recently enabled of payment through national convenient stores. According to a survey conducted by CyberAgent through its own flea market app ‘Maifri’, the numbers indicated that…

Mama&Crowd
Back in May, CyberAgent announced the launch of a business that would be specifically for mothers here in Japan. This is a natural and smart step for its Ameba platform, considering that many of its top Ameba bloggers are female celebrities with children. Mothers mean business.

For mothers, Ameba chose a crowdsourcing website as its first business, calling it Mama & Crowd. Although crowdsourcing is a busy market with existing players like Crowdworks and Lancers, Mama & Crowd will focus on mothers as its work force, and will provide work that doesn’t require such specialized skills — simple jobs like responding to questionnaires or writing short articles fo the web. Mama & Crowd will officially launch in late December, but it already begun its pre-registration on November 19th.

Here in Japan, we are seeing more and more apps and services for the mothers demographic. Prima is another example, a flea market mobile app for mothers. The app can be used to sell and buy used clothes and items for kids under 12. The app recently enabled of payment through national convenient stores.

According to a survey conducted by CyberAgent through its own flea market app ‘Maifri’, the numbers indicated that more businesses should enter this market. Female respondents between the ages of 20 to 30 with children were asked about their mobile phone usage. When asked whether smartphones have changed how they doing housework and raising children, 77% of respondents said that it has. Some examples of how mothers use their phones include searching for food recipes for cooking, and showing videos to kids when they’re crying in public. Almost 90% of mothers answered that the smartphone is a useful tool for them.

With smartphone becoming an essential part of motherhood, we can expect to see more apps targeting this particular segement in the future.

Mobile app lends a hand to expectant mothers in Japan

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There are many ways for expecting mothers to prepare for the birth of a child. One can participate in classes to learn about how to better care for a baby, buy baby beds and other necessary items in advance, and even baby-proof the house. Here in Japan, there is one other thing you can do to prepare. You can install a useful mobile app that helps women when they go into labor. It’s called ‘Jintsu-kitakamo‘. Jintsu Kitakamo can roughly be translated as ‘I think my contractions have started’. It lets you count the time that has passed between each contraction. When the pace between contractions shortens and mothers are close to going into labor, they can call pre-programmed phone numbers with a single tap. It could be your husband’s cell phone number, for example, or the number for a taxi company. The time you’ve counted can be sent by email, taking away the hassle of texting on your own to update concerned people such as your mother or your husband. The app also provides tips from ‘senpai’ mothers (those with children already) and lets new mothers ask questions regarding pregnancy in general. In Japan, many taxi companies provide services exclusively…

Jintsu-taxi

There are many ways for expecting mothers to prepare for the birth of a child. One can participate in classes to learn about how to better care for a baby, buy baby beds and other necessary items in advance, and even baby-proof the house. Here in Japan, there is one other thing you can do to prepare. You can install a useful mobile app that helps women when they go into labor. It’s called ‘Jintsu-kitakamo‘.

Jintsu-Kitakamo

Jintsu Kitakamo can roughly be translated as ‘I think my contractions have started’. It lets you count the time that has passed between each contraction. When the pace between contractions shortens and mothers are close to going into labor, they can call pre-programmed phone numbers with a single tap. It could be your husband’s cell phone number, for example, or the number for a taxi company.

The time you’ve counted can be sent by email, taking away the hassle of texting on your own to update concerned people such as your mother or your husband. The app also provides tips from ‘senpai’ mothers (those with children already) and lets new mothers ask questions regarding pregnancy in general.

In Japan, many taxi companies provide services exclusively for expectant mothers. By registering for the service in advance, these mothers are put on top of wait lists for urgent occasions. One popular service, ‘Jintsu Taxi‘, is provided by major taxi company Nihon Kotsu. A year after its launch, there were around 21,000 registered mothers-to-be, and it has been used 7,710 times. One in five pregnant women have registered to the service.

The birth of your first child can be very stressful, especially when you go into labor. Jintsu Kitakamo may be a very niche service, but it is one that definitely serves a great need.