Jimoty is one of Japan’s largest local information sites, with 10 million monthly users, 15 million members, and 17 million app downloads. Its users gather to find useful information that is close to them right now. In this article, we give a thorough walkthrough of Jimoty Ads (launched in 2023), from the fundamentals to live operation, including a real case from a client that provides local infrastructure services.
1. Jimoty Basics
What Is Jimoty?
Jimoty is a C2C platform launched in 2011. Built on the concept of circulating goods and information within the neighborhood, it now commands overwhelming traffic, as shown below.
- Monthly users: approximately 10 million people
- Monthly page views: over 900 million
- Posts: an average of over 5,000 per day (covering a wide range of topics, including not only unwanted items but also job listings and events)
Users access the site through both the app and the web, and the average session time per user is said to be around 7 minutes, indicating that many users take their time exploring local information.
1. 11 categories and over 200 subdivisions
Posts on Jimoty are organized into 11 major categories, with over 200 detailed subcategories beneath them.
| Major category | Examples of major subcategories | Industries with a high affinity for advertising |
|---|---|---|
| Sell / Give away | Furniture / Home appliances / Baby products / Outdoor | Home appliance repair and unwanted item collection |
| Recruiting members | Clubs / Sports / Gourmet… | Trial classes and fitness clubs |
| Help each other | Housekeeping / babysitting / pick-up and drop-off… | House cleaning and babysitting |
| Part-time job | Short term / Work from home / Events… | Logistics, customer service, light work |
| Classrooms and schools | Languages / music / programming… | Language classes and programming schools |
| Used cars | Light cars / motorcycles / parts… | Vehicle inspection, maintenance, and insurance |
| Events | Flea market / marche / exhibition… | Local events and local government PR |
| Full-time employee | Office work / construction / caregiving… | Locally based job openings |
| Real estate | Rental / sale / parking / share house… | Construction companies, renovations, and insurance |
| Local shops | Food and drink / beauty / medical care… | Take-out and clinics |
| Foster parents wanted | Dogs / cats / small animals… | Pet insurance and training classes |
Point
When delivering ads, you can also segment along two axes, category x municipality, so you can show ads on niche placements with little competition, such as “City A x detached house x DIY goods” or “Ward B x baby products.” This “local targeting” is said to be why the CPC stays low.
2. User attributes
User attributes are as follows: many are families living in the suburbs who own a detached house and a car.
- Income: the bulk falls between 4 million and 6 million yen per year
- Work: 40% are office workers and 20% are part-timers
- Other: 50% own their home and 80% own a car
3. Unique initiatives connecting online and offline
Jimoty is not just a “buy and sell app.” Because users access it daily as a part of their living infrastructure, they have little resistance to ads and tend to browse extensively. On top of that, initiatives like the following help Jimoty take root as living infrastructure.
- Jimoty Spot: in partnership with local governments, physical locations where people can drop off unwanted items, expanding brand awareness as a hub for local circulation.
- Public-private partnerships with local governments and businesses: incorporated into public initiatives such as reducing bulky waste in municipalities and reusing disaster stockpiles, earning credibility as social infrastructure.
4. Three characteristics of user behavior
Users on Jimoty have the following characteristics.
- Close-distance orientation: over 70% of post searches use the “within 10 km of current location” filter, giving a high affinity with community-based services.
- Solve-it-now needs: content for “same-day handover and same-day response,” such as furniture handovers and plumbing troubles, ranks at the top of the daily rankings.
- Price-sensitive but quick to act: while many users browse free or low-priced items, the funnel after a tap (the consideration period) is short because deals require on-site transactions or direct contact.
2. Jimoty Advertising Basics
From here we introduce the basics of Jimoty advertising.
Where Jimoty Ads Fit
“Jimoty Ads,” launched in 2023, has the following characteristics.
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Targeting | OS / gender / age / area / category |
| Billing method | Click-based (target CPC optimization) / conversion-based (target CPA optimization) |
| Minimum spend | 100,000 yen (testing possible at around 50,000 yen) |
| Time to launch | As few as 3 business days |
| Operation UI | An experience close to Meta Ads |
Ad Formats
| Placement | Recommended image size | Characteristics |
|---|---|---|
| In-feed small | 300 x 300 | Natural placement within the feed. Lowest CPC |
| In-feed large | 1200 x 628 | Strong visual appeal. CVR is slightly higher than small |
| Overlay | 1200 x 628 | Full-screen display on app launch. Highest CVR |
| Carousel | 300 x 300 | Natural placement within the feed |
Ad Format Submission Rules
The submission rules for each placement are as follows.
1. In-feed frame
2. Overlay frame
3. Carousel frame (the destination can be changed per creative)
Recommended Feature
With Jimoty Ads, you can dynamically change the title and text to match the user. This “keyword insertion feature” lets you display personalized ads, which is why we recommend it.
Submission image
| Image |  |
|---|---|
| Title | Daily-pay job / 10,000 yen per day |
| Title (keyword insertion) | [{age_group} {gender} in demand] Daily-pay job / 10,000 yen per day |
| Text | No resume, no interview! A daily-pay job app where you get paid the same day |
| Text (keyword insertion) | Many openings in {prefecture}! No resume, no interview! A daily-pay job app where you get paid the same day |
Display image
Delivery Logic
In Jimoty Ads, an auction runs as follows, and the ad from the ad group with the highest CPM (an evaluation metric, not the actual billing basis) is shown. CPM is calculated by the formula CTR x CPC, so improving CTR and CPC is important.
Conversion Tracking
As with other media, you can measure conversions by embedding the following two tags on your site. (They can also be embedded using Google Tag Manager.)
- Site tag: place inside the <head></head> of every page
- Conversion tag: place immediately after the site tag on the page that serves as the conversion point
Note that Jimoty Ads cannot measure multiple conversion events in a single account (for example, CV-1 with 3 events and CV-2 with 5 events). If you have multiple conversion points, such as a click on a LINE friend-add button and a thank-you page shown after a contact form is submitted, you need to handle it with one of the following approaches.
- Set up multiple conversion events in Google Tag Manager and count each event in Google Analytics
- Set a conversion event only on the single event you most want to optimize for
3. Jimoty Advertising Case Study
What We Ran
Here we introduce a case from a client we actually operated for.
- Client: a company providing infrastructure services in the greater Kanto area
- Service area: Tokyo, Saitama, Ibaraki
- Current challenges: they had been running ads on Meta and Google, but as competition grew their CPA had risen; the acquired users’ funnel was distant (a long consideration period), so it took time to reach an actual order
- Average monthly ad budget: about 300,000 yen per month
Operating Approach
Because the client provides a community-based service and the target was likely similar to Jimoty users, we decided to run Jimoty Ads. Although Jimoty recommends a delivery setup that earns 30 conversions per week, the budget was limited, so we delivered with the following settings.
Creative
Jimoty ad images have a characteristic where beautiful visuals and elaborately produced banners tend to earn a lower CTR. We cannot show the creative we actually ran, but we created creative with a real, everyday feel, like the images said to have a high CTR below.
| Images said to have a high CTR |  |
|---|---|
| Images said to have a low CTR |  |
Delivery Results
The delivery results were as follows. CVR (the conversion rate against clicks) was lower than on other media, but CPC (cost per click) was cheap, so CPA (cost per conversion) performance improved significantly as a result.
- CVR▼: 0.6% (about 1.1% on other media)
- CPA▽: 5,400 yen (about 9,000 yen on other media)
4. Summary
Why You Can Win Even When CVR Is Low
As the actual results show, even when CVR (the conversion rate against clicks) looks low, you can improve CPA (cost per conversion) performance. The reasons lie in the following characteristics of Jimoty Ads.
- You can advertise on niche placements with little competition, so CPC (cost per click) is low: being niche directly translates into low competition for ad slots. As a result, you can steadily acquire traffic at a low CPC.
- Even if CVR is somewhat low, the cheap CPC secures enough volume, so CPA improves: although CVR is low, the sheer volume pushes up the absolute number of conversions, which improves CPA.
- Ads are served while users browse posts in a “living infrastructure” context such as housing, cars, and DIY, so users have high purchase intent: users browse Jimoty with a “problem they want to solve,” so their receptiveness to ads is high.
- Because users want “nearby x solve it now,” their comparison and consideration after a click finishes quickly: as a result, the lead time to conversion is short and efficient customer acquisition can be expected.
Operating Tips
This time the main goal was validation, so we did not get far enough to accumulate learning data or optimize fully. However, if you can secure a few months of operation and budget, proceeding with a flow like the following would likely lead to acquiring more conversions.
- At the start of operation, use broad delivery to accelerate learning speed (aiming for about 30 conversions per week).
- If the daily budget is being spent without issue, increase the budget and raise the target CPA.
- Allocate 20 to 30% of the budget to overlay placements to secure high-CVR surfaces.
- Use the keyword insertion feature for dynamic swaps such as “city name” and “shortest time” to lift CTR.
- Once conversions start coming in, review the targeting and creative.
Recommended Products and Services
As Jimoty officially states, community-based services appear to be a very good fit. Below we summarize products and services that fit well with Jimoty Ads.
| Category | Examples | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Home troubles | Water, electricity, gas repair / pest control | Many “come right now” short-term solving needs |
| Renovation and exterior | Roof repair / garden pruning / parking lot paving | High detached-house ownership rate |
| Car-related | Vehicle inspection, tire changes, mobile car washing | Strong latent demand with 80% car ownership |
| House cleaning | Air conditioners, bathrooms, ventilation fans | Seasonal demand and same-day response resonate |
Products That Are a “Poor Fit” or Tend Not to Perform on Jimoty Ads
Depending on how you operate, acquisition is sometimes possible, but services like the following tend not to perform well.
| Genre | Main reason it is a poor fit | Notes and cautions |
|---|---|---|
| Nationwide D2C / EC-only mail order (cosmetics subscriptions, supplement subscriptions, etc.) | Users browse on the premise of “nearby x right now, direct pickup,” so products that assume shipping create a gap of “distance” and “wait time.” | Adding local elements like “in-store pickup” or “same-day delivery” leaves room for improvement. |
| High-end luxury goods (luxury watches, jewelry, bags) | Many users are highly price-sensitive, and appeals to intangible value worth hundreds of thousands of yen do not resonate. Clicks tend to rise while CVR does not grow. | For trade-in or buyback use, the affinity is good. |
| Pure BtoB SaaS / cloud services | Company size and decision-makers are limited, and Jimoty has no categories such as “business efficiency” or “corporate IT.” | If you shift toward “everyday corporate challenges” like hiring (job listings) or unwanted item buyback, validation is possible. |
| Standalone digital content (video subscription, online courses only, etc.) | Without a “local” or “real” hook, ad copy becomes abstract and CTR drops. In addition, many placements do not support video creative, narrowing the range of appeal. | It tends to perform better as offline courses or products bundled with local events. |
| Adult / gambling / dating | Delivery is prohibited or extremely restricted under media guidelines. Strongly affiliate-driven “high-reward offers” are likely to fail review. | — |
| High-risk finance (FX, crypto exchanges, high-yield investments) | The strictest category for “misleading representation” and “deceptive expression” reviews. Even the slightest exaggeration makes placement impossible. | Local finance (such as regional bank loan consultations) has a track record of passing. |
| Pharmaceuticals / medical advertising (prescription drugs, AGA, cosmetic medicine, etc.) | Submission documents under medical advertising guidelines are required, and additional review on Jimoty’s side often delays placement. | ”Free consultations” and “in-store pickup” at nearby dispensing pharmacies and drugstores are OK. |
| PC-only services / browser games | Jimoty Ads centers on smartphone app surfaces. Products expecting PC traffic have little exposure to begin with. | It is safer to make the LP fully mobile-first or to use another medium in parallel. |
Criteria for Choosing the Medium
As a rough guide, products without a “storefront / on-site service or locally completed offer” tend to see CPA spike, so we recommend delivering on another channel.
- Is “local, immediacy, real contact” thin? ⇒ Results are hard to achieve
- Does the price range diverge from the “bargain find” culture? ⇒ High-priced luxury goods struggle
- Is it subject to guideline restrictions? ⇒ Adult, speculative, and medical categories require official confirmation
Finally
Jimoty advertising is one of the few local advertising media that lets you pinpoint and reach users who are “in town right now” and “in need right now.” Because cost per click is easy to control, even a slightly lower CVR can significantly lower CPA, making it a true “second harvesting channel” for brick-and-mortar stores and community-based services. While we used infrastructure services as the example this time, the same logic can be applied to any product where “local” and “immediacy” are key. That said, it is hard to gauge the fit for your own company without actually moving the numbers. The initial investment starts at 100,000 yen, and submission is simple. Start with a small test run to see how your cost per click, CPA, and store-visit and conversion rates change. With fewer competitors, now is the time to maximize your first-mover advantage. Why not give Jimoty advertising a try?
