Now let’s discuss translation.
Apparently search engines depend on what they can read on your site to evaluate and rank the site.  But most translators don’t think about it.  They don’t think about what words people would use on Google or Yahoo to search for the products or services that your site offers.  They don’t study the competitors sites or PPC/ Adwords ads to learn the prevalent words they use. For example, if you are selling cashmere stoles, should you call them stoles or wraps? Should the description be luxury, soft or silky? Should it say made in Scotland or Scottish?

Doing a keyword research and using the right words in the copy of your website is critical. So the best way to translate your website is to do a keyword research first (in the target language), then translate using the right words and phrases. The result is search-query oriented text.  

So here is my suggestion. When you find a candidate for translation, ask if he or she offers keyword research. If not, try ask if he/she can study your competitors’ sites and provide you a glossary specific to your products and services (even if you can’t read the translated words).

Also, ask the translator to produce a good copy, not a word to word translation.  Request a sample translation for a few sentences from your website and have it reviewed by someone capable of reading and writing Japanese.

Here is my response:
The best way to SEO your website is to do it from the very beginning when planning and selecting a developer and a translator. Let’s first discuss selecting a developer.

If you choose a SEO minded developer, then your on-site SEO is almost halfway done. You just need to keep on building your content.

On the other hand, if your developer is not SEO minded, SEO-ing the website they develop can be restricted because of the way it is built.  For example, a tag may be missing in the code but it can not be added. Besides these limitations, fixing what is done is not efficient in terms of time and cost.

So how to select a good developer?  Like in other things, the more knowledge you have, the more questions you can ask to to pick the right one. There are endless supply or literature on SEO on the Internet. But if you are not in SEO business, that can be overwhelming. If you are new to SEO and need to find a good developer, here is what you can do to quickly screen out the least desirable ones.

1. Download Google’s “search-engine-optimization-starter-guide” and read about “page titles” and “description tag”:
   
   http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35291
2. Find the portfolio page on the developer’s site . If a portfolio is not available, ask for URLs of their past work.
3. Check the “page titles” and “description tag” on their past work against Google’s starter guide.

If you are interested in learning more about SEO, here is a good place to start.

For Website Payments Standard and Express Checkout, you probably want to check through some options at your PayPal account’s “profile” > “Selling Preferences”.

• PayPal accepts JCB.
• No set-up fees.  No monthly fees.
• Low transaction fees: 1.9% - 2.9% + $0.30 USD per transaction
• Fast and easy set-up.
• Buyers can pay with their credit card without having PayPal account .
• Buyers do not need to inform their credit card number to the seller.
• PayPal supports multiple currencies.

PayPal’s Japan site showing JCB logo here:

A drawback is that PayPal is not as widely used in Japan as in the US.  In particular, the fact that having PayPal account is not required to use the service does not seem to be known well.  Well, I did not know it until recrently, and I see confirming statements on the net.  So it would probably be a good idea to make sure the fact is clearly stated on your website where customers are about to start buying process.

What sets EC-CUBE apart from other CMS for Japan market is it’s capability to handle mobile phones - specifically, DoCoMo, SoftBank and au. From young to old, everyone in Japan surf the Internet using their cell phone, and to many of them their phone is the main tool to surf the net.

In addition, from what I read, EC-CUBE is suitable for small ecommerce site, relatively inexpensive, and has easy-to-use back-end. The drawback - for non Japanese speaking businesses - is that the back-end interface is in Japanese. Of course, it is technically possible to turn it to English, but no one seems to have done it yet.

One thing particular about Japan SEO is that you need to SEO your site both for Yahoo Japan and Google, since Yahoo Japan is used more than Google in Japan. Unlike other international branches of Yahoo, Yahoo Japan is an independent company owned by Tokyo based Softbank.  It offers most features of Yahoo but also carries its own programs and features.

On both sites, I re-organized the content and overhauled the navigation menu for search engine bots and for the human users. I also wrote and added copy, again for bots and human users, then I fortified the pages with proper tags, etc.

As of today (5/7/2010), and with the keywords the site owners targeted, the language school’s site is ranked number 1 (!) on the first page with Yahoo Japan, and listed on the second page with Google.co.jp. The vacation-rental site is also on the first page with Yahoo Japan but it’s on the 4th page with Google.co.jp.

Why are these sites ranked lower with Google? First thing that comes to my mind is incoming links. Both of these sites do not have many links form other sites, and maybe Google is more serious about incoming links than Yahoo Japan is. Could it be so?

Here are two examples.

• http://www.hannaandersson.com
• http://www.sigzane.com

Let’s look at Hanna Andersson’s.  It’s one of the best I have seen.
Their Japanese shopping guide includes:

• About Hanna Andersson
• About Hanna’s fabric
• Privacy policy / security
• Return policy
• Back order
• Shipping and custom
• Clothing size charts
• Shoes size charts
• Order status (input order number)
• Online shopping guide
• Error messages
• Payment method
• Q&A
• Free catalog

Both of the sites listed above have a Japanese speaking customer service person who can answer email inquiries in Japanese.  This is a huge plus.  Imagine that you are trying to shop at a site written in Japanese.  If you can write email to them in English, wouldn’t that make you feel much more comfortable to putting your credit number down?  It is not necessary to hire a part-time person for this if you are just testing out the Japan market.  You can outsource it to an email translation service.  We can arrange this for you, so please inquire about it.

Shopping guide and customer service in Japanese (or in another language) are good things to have even if your site is equipped with bilingual shopping cart.  If you can afford it, that would be ideal.  The point here is that with a good shopping guide and customer service in Japanese, a majority of your prospective Japanese customers will be fine in shopping at your site, and you can save by not developing and running a bilingual shopping cart.

I spent hours researching on the net, only to find that there seems to be no definite answer at this point.  Joomla! does seems to be favored, if you have to pick one.  What surprised me is that I could not find ANY website developer who has experience in building J/E bilingual ecommerce site with Joomla!  I inquired some website developers, but none of them have.  There are some who develop such sites using their own custom made CMS, but I prefer open source CMS because with custom (not open source) CMS, you are at the mercy of the developer in upgrades, cost and support.

Our web design parter, Paul at Tokyo Web Designs says, “Ecommerce is a tremendously complex area, and rather than re-invent the wheel, my goal is to find out which open source platform works best and configure/customize that to match my project requirements.  So far I haven’t found one that I am really satisfied with.”

Maybe it is too early and we don’t have a winner yet for J/E bilingual ecommerce CMS.  I will keep my eyes on this.

1.  YouTube
I know, everyone is doing it but neither my client or I have.
Here is a good article.
http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/how-to-use-youtube-to-increase-traffic-to-your-website-874385.html

2.  Hold a contest on the site
A classic link bait.  It creates a reason for potential customers - who may not purchase immediately - to visit your site.  Entering must to be easy and fun.  Prizes need to be attractive but not necessarily expensive.  Promotional goods such as logo T-shirt are good ones.  Local finds are possibilities.  Cross-promotion with a partner might work.

3.  Make lists
Make lists around your keywords.  For example, top 10 tips in buying (your product).  Top 5, 10, or any number will do.  When compiled, a list becomes a good resource on the subject.  Added on your blog, lists tend to rank well with search engines.

4.  Participate in forums
Most popular forum sites in Japan include: Yahoo Chiebukuro, Hatena and Oshiete Goo.  There may be other forum sites specific to your subject.  Be helpful and place no blatant advertisement.

5.  Comment on other blogs
To blog search, use Yahoo! Japan (Technorati Japan dissolved).

The last two are best handled by in-house staff.  It’s a labor intensive but sure way to add links on relevant content to your website.