I stopped using Google about a week ago. Bing is just that good. My understanding is that the engineers are a bit concerned how excellent Bing really is. Sure the execs are dismissing Bing as another Microsoft attempt at lapping up the scraps left behind by Google from people who haven’t updated their browser since IE4. But you can bet there has been a lot of late night strategy meetings to get control of this “Bing situation”. Got news for you folks: Bing is the real deal. First impressions are everything. Bing has it. Usability and results are what keeps people coming back. Bing has it.
For an Internet marketer it might be best to start thinking how this is going to affect you. Yea Google is the top dog and will remain that way for some time. But what if people start using Bing and they stay? Maybe Bing eats into Google’s market share by a few percentage points. This year it might be a few points. Next year a couple of more. Maybe Windows 7 is for real too and they implement Bing is that for search. Maybe Bing is used on Xbox in some manner. Who knows? Will people be more inclined to advertise on Bing? Will your Adsense revenue start taking a hit over the next year or two? Might be good to think how a viable Google search alternative could affect your online money making gig.
Google feels so…2007. It feels old and tired. Bing makes me happy. Searching at Google is boring. I took a screen print of an open search in Bing and will explain why I think it’s cool.
Anyway you slice it, Bing has pizzaz. Instead of a boring homepage for geeks and techies like Google has provided for ten years, with Bing you get a cool little photograph. It’s a nice change from the Google boredom.
How is the search experience? Fine, thank you. For all of us trying to find relevant keywords, or ideas, for our websites, check out the goodness Bing provides. Beneath your search term you get a list of keywords that pertain to your search. Google does this too so it’s not a huge win for Bing. But check out the related searches to the side. Google doesn’t provide that. This is helpful for those of us looking for ideas.
Speaking of search results. Google takes up more space with ads than Bing. It’s actually very cluttered if you compare it to Bing. These two following screen shots are taken from my laptop. Top to bottom of a search result. Notice the difference. With Bing, in the open window I can actually view 3, almost 4 results without having to scroll down. In Google, one barely fits on the screen before I’m mousing around. Interesting no?
Obviously the problem is the extra results for shopping. Maybe that is more helpful than not for people. And obviously the Google toolbar is a hindrance for results too. Google in their zeal to become everything for everyone has simply cluttered a typical search in my opinion. It just looks ugly compared to to Bing.
Okay let’s continue with the search results. To the right of each is a little slider bar looking thing. If you mouse over it a popup window appears giving you a preview of what that page is about. Pretty nifty. But dig what that means for your business. If you are writing crap for your website and just assuming that people are going to visit and click out via Adsense, I think this is another nail in that coffin. You are going to have to write shit that people will actually find useful or they ain’t going to bother visiting. They will just keep previewing until something works for them.
Below is a favorite feature of mine. The image viewer. It works really well. You can set up the listings in whatever manner you want as seen in the little icons. You mouse over the image and it pops up as seen below. If you click the picture then it takes you to another Bing page that shows the web site that it came from.
I like that it so elegantly displays the website the photo came from in another frame. It looks so much better than Google’s. Again the functionality is not that different but style is everything these days. Bing blows Google away. And frankly the functionality and results are comparable.
So there you have it. Bing is king. For IM purposes I like how it gives up ideas. BTW, check out the more tab and click over to xRank. It will give you further ideas of stuff that is hot for the day. The photo thing is cool because if you use photos in your sites/blogs then it will entice people to visit. I get tons of people visiting my sites through the photos I have posted. I think this will add to that. I’ve also noticed that I am getting more traffic each day on some of my WordPress blogs and the Today.com blog from Bing searches. Mostly from folks finding a photo and visiting.
I should have put this in an ebook and sold it for $97, $47, $27, $17 dollars.
{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }
Sounds good Splork. Have you submitted any of your websites to bing directly or did bots just come crawling as usual?
I do like their cool photos and agree it’s a refreshing change from big blue.
The Bing homepage is way cooler than Google. What is really suprising is that Microsoft might have finally done something right.
It does make me wonder as to why they were going after Yahoo’s search business.
As much as I absolutely detest Microsloth, I have to agree with you. Bing really does kick Google in the privates. Hopefully it will wake up the sleeping giant and they’ll get their act together. A little competition is always good for stimulating change.
I haven’t submitted any sites directly to Bing. Most appear to all be listed though.
I ran a couple of my best sites through Bing on Ranktracker. I have about 60% fewer keywords ranking in the top 100 on Bing, and of the ones that do rank, nearly all of them rank lower than on Google. I noticed that Bing gives more weight to site title–those unnecessary words like “guide” and “best” end up ranking in Bing as long tails. My strategy is built around broad niches with precisely titled posts because it works in Google. If I build sites for Bing, I’ll be buying a lot more domain names.
Pain in the ass to have to use two different strategies, but I agree that Macro$loth has finally done something right.
Yea that’s a good point. Both SEO differently. And I would definitely not be trying to optimize for Bing at this point. Google is still king and will remain king for a long while. Nothing changes with the way we do business for now. But I think it’s useful to be aware of what is out there. I checked my best Adsense site that ranks #1-3 (it varies) in Google…it is not in the top 100 in Bing. I think it’s because it has dashes in it. (I bought it 4-5 years ago not knowing what I was doing.) It doesn’t rank for anything in Bing. Disheartening.
That said, from a personal standpoint, Bing has become my search engine of choice for now.
Not insignificant. Wonder if they can continue momentum?
“Bing momentum continues through week-two since the launch, with U.S. search penetration up 0.9 percentage points to 16.7% – from 13.7% pre-Bing. Its share of search result pages also climbed 0.9 points to 12.1%, vs. 9.1% two weeks ago.”
I sure hope that Bing does take away some market share. I hate the fact that Google has over 50% percent of the SE market..
I am not using Bing at all, but if it makes a dent in Google’s dominance then so be it. Now, if Microsoft could only make IE as fast, lightweight, and error free as Firefox, then you might just have something there Mr. Gates..
Let the SE battle begin..
Robert C – The Wholesale Products Guy
Thank you for the post. I really like Bing, even my wife uses it now as well. I am impressed that they finally focused on user experience and style, while Google is the one who now looking like… well old-school Microsoft. Boring, utilitarian, and cold.
Their rewards program for shopping on Bing will bring a lot of customers there way. I guess their tv commercials are having a big impact as well.
Bing is a pain in the ass for webmasters. And the search returns are so predictable. It is a waste.
I went to Bing for one thing: New.
I decided that a one-search-engine world was not a good thing, so I went to Bing. I decided that Google can doogle just about anythoogle any other engine can do and they don’t need my daily opening o’ the browser to survive. So I realized that if I needed to search for anything, Bing would be fine. Just like any search engine would be. Bing blew my mind!
I look forward to the amazing image that awaits me each morning with four (no more, no less) teasers to click upon that relate directly to the image I am enjoying.
Seriously people, don’t be loyal to any search engine because it’s what you’ve always used. Give Bing a try (if you have decent connectivity) and you’ll be happy too.
I would like to thank Bing and the clever people who think-up those captions to go with the beautiful photo o’ the day. I am really enjoying my Bing experience, and everyday, I feel like I’m stickin’ it to Google…. I never had enough money to invest in their IPO. Oh, don’t worry, I don’t own any MSFT either… I’m poor, but happy with Bing.
P.S. My PS3 is the thing I love for stickin’ it to MSFT, so I’m an equal-opportunity pauper. ACE
Bing is great! I love it compared to Google now.
Lani
Sorry, but Google gives me so many more sites to choose from when I search…I missed a lot when I “Binged”
Bing isn’t kicking anyone’s butt — in fact, it isn’t going anywhere.
The latest marketshare report from Hitslink shows Google with a commanding 85% market share of worldwide searches compared to 3% for Bing. Bing is even beaten out by the Chinese language only (and heavily censored) search engine Baidu.
I was less than impressed by Bing’s “decision engine”. It returns far less depth and less relevant results than Google. Searching for the acronym “MSE” yields anything BUT Microsoft Security Essentials, like it does on Google. Go figure, huh?
The winning feature of Google is it’s simplicity. Just give me a plain white page with a search box in it. That’s what contributed to Google’s success over other popular engines in the day, such as AOL and MSN. In fact, that’s still why I use it (besides having the best search algorithm out there today). Sure, I could use iGoogle and get my news, headlines, e-mail, GPS location, and a dog that chases your cursor. But, why bother? I’m on a search engine because I need t o find something and would prefer to do it quick.
Google’s plain approach isn’t just for “nerds”. It’s for people who want a no-frills approach to just getting things done.
But maybe this is all about sour-grapes? The only reason I got here was because I was annoyed at Bing’s poor results and typed in “Bing takes it in the a** from Google”. Your site, despite arguing the opposite, came up first. More Bing fail.
However, you don’t show up under Google. Interesting.
Thanks for commenting on a year old post.
I have zero interest in this site coming up in any search engine. You would know that if you weren’t a drive by visitor.
I’m glad you enjoy Google’s search engine experience. I never said that Bing would gain market share or even care if they do or don’t. What I said a year ago was that I enjoyed the search experience more than Google and personally found the results kicked Google’s ass. Perhaps if you actually read the post you would have caught the drift.
Your view on Bing is not shared by all. I tried bing out several times and found the results constantly paled in comparison to Google’s.
Bing was a great attempt, but fell miles short of catching up to Google or Yahoo.
I hope my view on anything is not shared by any.
I have to say that bing has a more welcoming appearance… I tried bing for a while…. now i dont think I am going back.
Google search is boring and cluttered… moreover, i get all my queries answered through bing… I dont have to go to Google anymore.
I’m ready for something different than Google and Bing. I find them both boring and annoying.
I personally believe that Bing is better than Google. All my sites rank #1 in Bing, but not in Google.
And oh, thanks for sharing your SEO tools. Appreciate it.