Why Bing Deserves Your Attention
Bing powers search results on Bing.com, Yahoo, AOL, and DuckDuckGo (for ad placements), collectively reaching a significant share of desktop searches in the United States. The Microsoft Search Network reaches hundreds of millions of unique searchers monthly, many of whom do not use Google as their primary search engine.
Bing's audience tends to skew slightly older and more affluent than Google's. Many Bing users are on Windows computers where Bing is the default search engine in Microsoft Edge. This audience is often overlooked by advertisers, meaning less competition and lower advertising costs for your business.
On average, cost-per-click on Microsoft Advertising is 30 to 50 percent lower than Google Ads for the same keywords. If you are already running successful Google campaigns, importing them into Microsoft Advertising is one of the easiest ways to expand your reach while stretching your budget further.
Microsoft Advertising (Bing Ads)
Microsoft Advertising works similarly to Google Ads. You create text and shopping ads, bid on keywords, and pay per click. One of its best features is the ability to import campaigns directly from Google Ads. This means you can replicate your existing campaigns in minutes rather than building them from scratch.
After importing, adjust your bids and budgets to account for the different competition levels on Bing. You will often find that the same keywords cost significantly less, which means you can maintain the same budget for more clicks or reduce your spend while getting similar results.
Microsoft Advertising also offers unique targeting options not available in Google Ads, including targeting by LinkedIn profile data such as company, industry, and job function. For B2B businesses, this is an extremely powerful feature that allows you to reach professionals based on their career information.
Bing Webmaster Tools
Bing Webmaster Tools is a free platform that helps you understand how your website performs in Bing's organic search results. Like Google Search Console, it shows which queries drive traffic to your site, how your pages are indexed, and any technical issues that might affect your visibility.
- SEO reports: Bing scans your site and provides specific recommendations for improving your search visibility, including page titles, meta descriptions, heading structure, and mobile-friendliness.
- URL submission: Submit new or updated pages directly to Bing's index so they appear in search results faster. This is especially useful when you launch new content or make significant changes to existing pages.
- Backlink data: See which websites link to yours and the anchor text they use. This helps you understand your site's authority and identify link-building opportunities.
- Site scan: An automated crawler that checks your entire site for common SEO errors, broken links, and technical issues that could hurt your rankings.
Bing Places for Business
Bing Places is the equivalent of Google Business Profile. It lets you manage your business listing in Bing search results and Bing Maps. Claiming and optimizing your Bing Places listing ensures that local searchers find accurate information about your business, including your address, hours, phone number, and photos.
You can import your Google Business Profile directly into Bing Places, saving time on data entry. After importing, verify that all information is accurate and add any Bing-specific details like categories and service areas. Keeping both profiles up to date ensures consistency across search engines.
Microsoft Clarity
Microsoft Clarity is a free behavior analytics tool that shows how visitors interact with your website. It provides heatmaps that visualize where people click, scroll, and move their cursor, plus session recordings that let you watch individual user journeys through your site.
Clarity can reveal why visitors leave without converting. Maybe they get confused by your navigation, miss your call-to-action button, or encounter a broken form. These insights are invaluable for improving your website's conversion rate and complement the traffic data you get from Bing Webmaster Tools and Microsoft Advertising.
Getting Started with Bing Marketing
The fastest way to start marketing on Bing is a three-step approach:
- Claim your Bing Places listing and verify that your business information is accurate. Import from Google Business Profile if you have one.
- Set up Bing Webmaster Tools and submit your sitemap. Review the SEO recommendations and fix any critical issues.
- Import your Google Ads campaigns into Microsoft Advertising and adjust budgets. Start with a modest daily spend and expand as you see results.