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Tourists visiting Japan has been increasing steadily over the years. In the marketing world Japanese have been using the word “Inbound” and “Outbound” a lot lately.
 

The Japanese definition:

Inbound: Tourists from oversea countries to that come to Japan. This also includes, products and services for or sold to foreign tourists. Literally the two words “IN” and ”BOUND”.
Outbound: To travel from Japan to overseas. This also includes, products and services expanded to be sold overseas from Japan. Literally the two words “OUT” and ”BOUND”.

These are the only definitions that Japanese people usually know. Even in the marketing world! But in the english speaking marketing world they mean completely different things.

Inbound: Marketing techniques to be carried out with specific targeting to bring those people in to you. This can mean any direct contact marketing, SNS, Google adwords, blogs anything that targets people who may be interested and interacts with them offline or online.

Outbound: A traditional advertising you have likely seen many times. Usually require a larger budget and send out indirect non-personal advertising to a wide audience. TV commercials,  newspaper advertisements, pop up ads,  marketing techniques extensively performed.

In this image “Outbound” is referred to as “Interruption Marketing” They are the same thing with outbound being just the opposite of Inbound.
http://www.wordstream.com/images/what-is-inbound-marketing.png

If a Japanese person says “I want to do “inbound”” to an english speaker, they will not understand the Japanese meaning. The Japanese person actually should say, “I would like to make my business more international”.

If you work in Japan, it’s useful to understand these english words with different Japanese meanings.