I’m happy to continue my interview series with my next guest Naomi Suzuki, a Japanese WordPress developer and Influencer. So, let’s get started.
Hey Naomi, please introduce yourself. 😊
I’m Naomi Suzuki from Japan.
I’ve been making YouTube videos and articles about WordPress focusing on tools from outside of Japan.
Where are you from? Why have you decided to relocate to another country?
I’m originally from Japan, but I’ve lived more than half of my life outside of Japan.
My father traveled the world when he was young and he was always talking about his adventures when I was little.
It influenced me to leave Japan after I graduated from high school.
Where/how have you studied/learned WordPress?
I was a professional web developer for more than 10 years in the US. One day I realized it’s so much easier to make websites with WordPress without writing code and I just started playing with it. Because of my background, it was not so difficult to grasp the concept.
When/Why did you decide to start a blog, a Japanese/English YouTube channel?
I started learning about WordPress and its modern third-party tools about 3 years ago.
I noticed Japanese people were using WordPress but they were writing a lot of code to make a simple website.
They were wasting so much time. I realized Japanese people don’t speak English so they didn’t even know those tools even existed. That’s when I thought they needed to know the modern way to make websites.
So I decided to make a blog and a YouTube channel.
I just started the English channel to see if I can provide valuable information in English as well but it’s been slow and I need to work on it harder.
Why have you chosen to use WordPress CMS?
Because it’s used by 43% of all websites in the world and I was sure it would last for a long time.
I find your newsletter very interesting, are you preparing it by yourself? (P.S. Happy to have Google translate😁)
Oh no, you are reading it.
Honestly, I should have written something more serious if I knew you were reading it!
I’m writing it myself every week.
Are there any peculiarities (pros/cons) of the Japanese WordPress market?
As I mentioned earlier, Japanese people don’t speak English and they tend to avoid services and tools only available in English. WordPress isn’t an exception. When themes and plugins don’t have Japanese translation, then they can’t be popular there.
On the other hand, if you can provide your services in Japanese, then there won’t be much competition.
Is WordPress popular among Japanese Web Developers?
I believe so. I personally know many people using WordPress for their web development work.
Are you a website developer freelancer? How can anyone order the website creation from you?
I’m not really a website developer at this moment. I sometimes help with some projects but I’m more of a teacher so my main focus is to create content.
But hey, if you are interested in talking with me, this is my email address: [email protected].
Why do you think no-code website development become popular?
People used to drive stick shifts and now almost everyone drives automatic in many places in the world.(I know it’s not the case in Europe😁). Autonomous cars will take over the market in the near future.
People love automation so they can gain more time and focus on other problems.
The world of web development is the same way. I used to write so many lines of code to do one thing which you can do with one line of code now.
We already can make complicated websites without writing code, especially with the help of amazing tools, like Crocoblock.
What are your top WordPress tools?
Elementor & Crocoblock for sure.
What tools do you use to record/edit your videos?
I shoot with Sony a7iii and record screen with Ecamm Live with and edit with Davinci Resolve.
How did you find Crocoblock products?
One day, I found a video from WPTuts about JetEngine and I was instantly fascinated by the ability of JetEngine to create complicated systems.
I knew nothing like that existed in the Japanese market so I decided to show that to Japanese people.
Please share your social networks, so the Community will be able to follow you:
Japanese YouTube, English YouTube.
Hope you enjoyed reading this interview, the more is coming, so don’t hesitate to follow Crocoblock social media.
