But who or what is Bing, and why should your company get interested in using it for your marketing strategy?
What is Bing?
Bing is a popular search engine powered by Microsoft with advanced searched options for consumers and companies.
Bing boasts 3% of the search engine traffic in the world. It may not sound like much, but in a world where 63% (5 billion people) use the internet, 3% adds up to a huge market!
Like most search engines, Bing allows you to create ads and use keywords to rank higher and reach a wider audience.
Why should you use Bing?
1. Lower competition
As we already mentioned, Google has the monopoly on search engine users on the internet. You might think this means fewer people will see your company as a result of using Bing, but it’s the opposite that’s true.
Because there is less competition to rank on the first page of the results, you’re more likely to do so on Bing than Google.
2. Bing x Yahoo
Bing is directly connected to a little website called Yahoo! For those who don’t know what Yahoo is, it’s predominately a search engine with the 5th highest traffic in the US.
As Bing and Yahoo work together, it provides better potential ROI.
3. Transparency in SEO
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the technique used to ensure your website and content rank highly on search pages. Google is notorious for its confusing SEO guidelines that no one truly knows how it works and which change every couple of years.
Bing is much more transparent with its SEO guidelines, making it easier to get marketing strategies right. Because Yahoo uses the same algorithm as Bing, you know your content will be correctly optimized.
4. Easier to list local businesses
Placing your business on Bing business is easier thanks to its streamlined local businesses page. And Bing even gives local businesses a boost!
5. Social media integration
Unlike Google, Bing includes social media content in their results, meaning you can get your Instagram and Twitter posts seen by a wider audience!
6. Cheaper ad prices
Buying ads on Bing is, on average, 30% cheaper than Google, which is perfect for smaller businesses that don’t have a big marketing budget.
Speaking of Bing ads…
What are Bing ads?
Bing offers businesses the opportunity to buy ads that will be seen on the front page for certain keywords. Again, most businesses tend to opt for Google, but we’ve seen companies successfully advertise on Bing and generate great revenue.
A great example of this is the clothing brand, The North Face. The North Face creates warm apparel for extreme winter weather and is famous for its high-quality, functional clothing.
North Face makes an average revenue of 100 – 200m annually from their Bing ads. This proves that advertising on Bing is a viable and lucrative strategy when you get your marketing strategy right and your content and products are of high value to customers.
What are the benefits of Bing advertising?
1. Higher CTR
CTR or Click Through Rate is an important KPI for buying ads. It doesn’t matter how many people see your ads if they aren’t clicking on them to continue their buyer journey.
It’s also vital for ROI. If it takes £1000 of adverts to get one click on Google and £900 of adverts to get one click on Bing, then Bing is a more cost-effective solution. And it’s well documented that Bing ads have a much higher CTR than Google ads.
This is thought to be because Yahoo is a common destination for finance and shopping, so the people on these sites are much more likely to be interested in ads.
2. Personalize ad campaigns by time zone
For international companies that either work exclusively with digital products or who ship internationally, being able to specifically market to different time zones is an extremely valuable benefit.
When you research content creation, advertising, and posting time, you’ll see each region has different hours when people are most engaged online. If you can target every single time zone of interest with just one advertising campaign, you will optimize the number of people likely to see and engage with your ad.
3. You can advertise for specific devices
Just like advertising specifically for time zones, being able to target specific devices is also beneficial.
Different companies will find that the majority of their traffic comes from specific devices – phones, tablets, and/or computers. If you can narrow your target audience to a specific device, you can create a more cost-effective advertising plan that yields higher conversion results.
4. More complex design options
The best ads rely on a mixture of words and design to attract interest. However, on Google, it can be difficult to tailor your ad to a design that suits your brand because options are pretty limited.
On Bing, you have a wide range of customization options that allow you to personalize your message and increase the likelihood of searchers clicking on your ad.
This could then lead to increased conversion rates.
Key Takeaways
While Bing has fewer overall users, your business will have less competition to rank highly on search pages, leading to a higher likelihood of discovery.
This, coupled with the cost-effective tools available from Bing, mean employing Bing as part of your marketing strategy could be an advantageous move that greatly increases your ROI.
