The phenomena known as social media ad fatigue has made it increasingly difficult for brands to capture users’ attention. As more companies adopt social media advertising as a standard practice, its proliferation has soured their target audiences.
In This Article
How Social Media Ad Fatigue Affects Digital Marketing in Japan
The rising issue of ad fatigue is prevalent all over the world, and Japan isn’t immune to its effects either. Japanese social media users are becoming more vocal, and brands are definitely feeling the burn.
For instance, according to a recent 2025 survey, nearly 90% of consumers feel that advertisements on websites and social media apps have become excessive. More troubling, 81% of respondents say that excessive ads made them less likely to take action, and left them with a bad impression of advertisers.
On the brand side, 74% of advertisers have attributed a noticeable decline in CTR and CVR to ad fatigue. Instead of increasing brand value, advertisers are concerned running ads are having an opposite effect.
How to Advertise on Social Media Effectively
Numbers don’t lie; consumers feel overwhelmed and annoyed, while brands fear damage to their reputation as a result. Is the solution to stop running ads on social media altogether? Certainly not.
As a digital agency, we see this as both a challenge and an opportunity. What you need is to employ a more thoughtful strategy that helps you stand out, and in a good way. This simply comes down to making sure you aren’t exhausting your audience.
Diversify and Refresh Creatives
An easy way to turn potential customers off from your messaging is by blasting the same message repeatedly. Remember this: in digital advertising, repetition breeds resentment. You’re literally training your audience to tune you out.
To prevent this, we recommend building up a broad library of creatives. This can mean multiple variations of copy, and for display ads, we strongly recommend having a wide selection of visuals. Rotate these regularly to keep your messaging fresh.
You can further simplify and automate the process with the use of Dynamic Creative Optimization. The tool utilizes real-time user data to combine your best ad text, images and CTAs and deliver a personalized ad experience.
Prioritize Value over Frequency
After repetitiveness, frequency can be the second-biggest danger to your advertising strategy. While delivering the same stale message can tire consumers of your brand, high ad frequency can actively turn them against you.
Retargeting is typically where the issue of over-serving ads comes into play. You want to keep your message in the back of customers’ minds, but you don’t want to appear in every single place they visit online. When social media users feel like they’re being chased, it leaves an uncomfortable feeling—especially in Japan.
Choose your platform(s) wisely and set frequency caps so your ads aren’t being served too often. When users do see your ads, make sure there’s something useful in it for them. This could be tips, insights or case studies. Promotions are okay on occasion, but don’t go for the hard sell. Japanese customers don’t respond to this type of messaging well.
Respect the Japanese Social Media User Experience
One of the most avoidable mistakes foreign brands make when advertising in Japan is intrusiveness. There are certain types of ads that aren’t well-liked by audiences in general, but they’re much more strongly dislike in Japan. These ads include:
- Full-screen ads
- Ads that activate on their own and are hard to close or dismiss
- Pop-up ads that display suddenly during site navigation
In the context of social media advertising, the easy way to combat this is to:
- Utilize ad formats that feel native and blend with the flow of the platform
- Avoid video ads with autoplay and sound. Walking and public transport are the most common ways Japanese people commute. Any sudden sounds in public spaces can draw unwanted attention, and could reflect poorly on you in the eyes of the user.
ICJ: Strategic Social Media Advertising Done Right
The issue of ad fatigue is generally a collective one. Seemingly too many brands taking up feed space to advertise. That won’t change any time soon, because social media marketing in Japan is still trending upward. But you can still set yourself apart strategically to avoid being seen as just another 15-second spot in the digital ad stew.
That’s where we come in. We have long-standing relationships with clientele, so naturally we’ve encountered this same issue. Luckily, by employing different strategies—including some of those mentioned here—we’ve managed to improve brand impressions and user engagement.
