Have You Considered Bing As An Alternative SEM Platform?

If you have, until this point, neglected Bing as part of your search engine marketing campaign, you’re not alone. While Bing’s ad revenue for 2018 was $US3.2 billion, its major competitor Google made almost 40 times that amount from advertising in the same year, with revenue amounting to almost $US116.3 billion. 

It’s no secret that Google dominates the search engine market. Google is the first search engine that most users think of when they have a query. In fact, the latest Netmarketshare report stated that 73% of global searches are powered by Google and only 7.91% by Bing. Savvy digital marketers know these stats and as such, they know that by using Google, they have greater potential to reach a wider target audience.  

There’s no getting away from the fact that Google is the leading search engine, however, that doesn’t mean that Bing should be disregarded.  There are significant advantages for digital marketers who are using Bing in combination with, or instead of, Google.

Why You Should Consider Bing Advertising

Bing is all too often overlooked as a platform for search advertising, as it just doesn’t have the same scale as Google. However, this may be an oversight on the part of digital marketers and statisticians who don’t look deeper into the data. Global search engine statistics are slightly skewed and according to the latest data, Bing has a 33% market share in the United States. It also has a significant market share in other countries across the globe. Bing has 145 million active users who perform over six billion unique searches per month. Regardless of whether Google has more, this is a huge opportunity for digital marketers to reach their target audience. 

In addition to its significant reach, the real advantage of Bing Ads is that it is so underused, which makes it particularly effective for advertisers in competitive fields. Millions of advertisers are using Google to promote their business, which means increased competition that drives up the cost of bids. Bing advertisers have less competitors and as such, cost per click is significantly lower.  With cheaper clicks, advertisers can spend less and get more conversions, which means that the channel often has a higher ROI. 

Who Advertisers can Reach on Bing

Bing has released useful demographic information on its active users to help advertisers identify whether they are likely to reach their target audience on the platform. The search engine does offer the opportunity to identify demographics, behaviours and interests that advertisers want to target, however, there are key characteristics of users that can be of use to businesses thinking of using the platform.

Bing has stated that 40% of their network is 35-54 years old and half of its users are married or living with a partner. The search audience on Google is a lot younger. Furthermore, over a third of Bing users have a household income of $100,000 or more. For marketers who are specifically targeting this audience with their products and services, Bing may be a good platform for generating conversions. Alternatively, if the business objectives for search engine marketing are to increase brand awareness and drive significant traffic to the website, Bing may be of more use run in conjunction with a complimentary Google Ads campaign.

The Future of Bing Advertising

Microsoft reported record results in the fourth quarter of FY17-18.  While this can mostly be attributed to the growth of the company’s cloud services, Bing is also generating revenue for the business. The search engine has been steadily growing in the last years and has seen a 17% increase in revenue year on year. More and more people are turning to Bing to answer their queries. Revenue is undoubtedly growing for the platform, and while it may never take over from Google as the dominant search engine, Bing is a vital digital platform for advertisers. It is a viable alternative to Google for reaching a different audience and growing visibility.

Bing knows that it has a good position in the search engine market and has been developing its product offerings to encourage more businesses and consumers to use it. The search engine has advanced its search results to give more information on top-level search queries. It has also enhanced its search results through its search entity API, which produces results that include entities and places to provide a richer contextual search result. Bing is also known for being the more visually appealing search engine, with superior design on its home page and search results pages.

For more information on using Bing Advertising as part of your digital marketing strategy, get in touch with the experts at Digital Squad.

On top of our SEO expertise, we are a digital marketing agency Auckland who can help you with your social media marketing Auckland, Google Shopping Auckland, Bing ads and Google display network ads. Additionally, talk to us on how your business can leverage the power of programmatic advertising Auckland.