Don’t Forget About Bing

Google is great. Google currently accounts for about 65% of total US searches. For marketers, it can be tough to look beyond that. The people are using Google, so I must be on Google, you tell yourself.

But 65%, while dominant, is nowhere near 100%. There are a lot of other consumers out there using other search engines.

Currently occupying the number 2 position in the standings, it’s Bing. Bing gets approximately 20% of all searches in the US.

That alone should be enough to convince advertisers to add Bing to their search marketing strategy. But there are two other bits of anecdotal insight that should make Bing that much more appealing.

  1. Competition among advertisers on Bing is lower than Google, and therefor cost per clicks are often lower for the keywords you’re bidding on.
  2. If you ask experienced search engine marketers, they’ll tell you that often a Bing customer is better than a Google customer. Either they’re more likely to shop and make a purchase after clicking on an ad, or they spend more, or they become a return customer at a higher rate than people clicking through on a Google ad.

Now, knowing that 20% of your customers (potentially more depending on your industry) are using Bing, not Google, and knowing that you might be able to find them for less, and generate a better return, can you really afford to ignore the second biggest search engine in the country? I think not.