To be engaged in modern marketing is to be immersed in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). The question is always, “How can I raise my rank on Google?” Yes, having your site favored by the world’s largest search system is very important.
But another big question, with an answer often worth even more, is about how to rank on Bing. There are significant financial advantages for site owners who invest in Bing search engine marketing. So, to maximize your web marketing effectiveness, let’s see how SEO works in Bing.
Bing History
Bing is the world’s second-largest search engine. Microsoft launched MSN Search in 1998, which became Windows Live Search, then just Live Search, then Bing. Later, Bing began powering Yahoo searches too. So yes, Bing search optimization also includes Yahoo.
Bing is now Microsoft's default search engine, so many Windows users use it. In total, around 100 million people use Bing daily and don’t use Google. Average Bing users are educated men and women, ages 35 to 54, living in the U.S. with a household income over $75K.
What's Bing SEO?
Bing search optimization is the process of optimizing your website to improve its visibility and ranking on Bing search engine results pages (SERPs). It means taking the necessary measures to optimize your website so that it will more likely attract the search engine’s crawlers. Those actions might include:
- Increasing page speed by optimizing your graphics and other visual elements.
- Optimizing URLs.
- Upgrading the quality of content and keywords.
- Enhancing data security.
- Increasing backlinks.
Understanding the Bing Search Algorithm
Just the names of Bing algorithm crawlers provide enough insight into how Bing SERP listings are generated. Here are the primary Bing crawlers:
- Bing indexing – Be sure to check to confirm that your web pages are indexed.
- Bingbot -– This technology performs most of Bing’s daily desktop and mobile crawling.
- AdIdxBot – This bot crawls desktop and mobile Ads and associated websites for quality.
- BingPreview – Bing takes Microsoft web page snapshot previews.
- User/Agent – Bing crawlers enable you to set the hourly rate for crawling.
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Bing SEO vs. Google SEO
It may appear that making a site rank in Google extends to all the other search engines. But, the algorithms aren’t identical. The two use similar processes to generate SERPs for users’ queries, but the indexing priorities, ranking factors, and other elements of the search engine programming are not necessarily aligned.
Fortunately, SEO for Bing involves a lot of the same criteria applicable to Google, which means that with a little added effort, you can optimize for both engines.
By the way, one of the key differences and advantages of Bing compared to Google is that it’s much more clear how Bing search engine worksand what its factors for ranking are. So, you can rank, convert searches to visits, and convert visits to sales much more easily on Bing than on Google.
Some of the ranking criteria SEO for Bing shares with that of Google are:
- Quick Page Loading
- High-Quality Content (although, Bing doesn't have explicit quality criteria similar to EEAT).
- Video and Images
- Schema Markup
- Meta Tags and Descriptions
- Quality Backlinks
In short, like Google, the Bing engine recognizes good user experience, healthy page speed, media content, and relevance.
However, there are also unique Bring ranking factors:
- Domain Age and Authority – Bing reportedly gives more weight to older domains compared to Google.
- Desktop and Mobile – Google’s priority is appealing to mobile users, which bumps mobile-friendly sites on its SERPs, whereas Bing prioritizes sites attracting desktop users and mobile-friendly sites.
- Social Signals – Bing reportedly factors in social signals more heavily than Google. Engaging in social media marketing can boost your ranking on Bing.
- Exact Match Keywords – Unlike Google, Bing prefers exact match keywords.
- Keyword Stuffing Tolerance – Bing may be more tolerant of keyword stuffing to some extent compared to Google, although both search engines discourage this practice.
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Benefits of Bing SE Optimization
A surprising key advantage of marketing on Bing is that it’s smaller than Google. After all, since every marketer is busy pursuing Google, there’s much less competition on Bing. Yet, it is Google’s largest competitor, with nearly 7% of the worldwide search market share.
Although that may seem like a small amount in contrast with Google’s nearly 87%, it reflects over 41% growth of Bing over just the past 5 years.
Bing benefits website owners in many ways:
- Smaller Competition – As mentioned, there is less competition on Bing than Google. With SEO, site owners are more likely to reach higher rankings and draw more attention.
- Lead-Qualified Traffic – Bing's traffic quality may be higher than Google's. Bing users are often searching with a greater intent to purchase. Bing organic traffic also tends to have a better conversion rate.
- Voice Search Optimization – Both Cortana (Microsoft) and Alexa (Amazon) use Bing for voice search. So, Bing SEO must become a priority for website owners who want to succeed with voice search.
- Offset AI Search Inconsistencies – Bing’s new AI integration is a major search engine advancement, delivering more accurate, detailed, and personalized results, to enhance the user experience.
- Fewer Ad Results – Google and Bing both have appealing UIs, but Bing posts fewer ads on its SERPs. That means users can see more non-commercial search results per page.
To sum up, SEO for Bing can yield access to a high-value audience, high rankings with lower competition, and connection with a more mature and conversion-oriented user base.
Bing Keyword Search and Tracking
Bing keyword volume is naturally less than Google’s for a simple reason: Bing search volume is less. That’s why it makes sense that Bing’s priority is to locate the best-optimized content and target exact-match keywords. Bing keywords usually include some number of long-tail keywords.
Long-tail keywords are specific and less competitive phrases that typically have lower search volumes. However, they are crucial for Bing SEO because they can drive more targeted and relevant traffic. To effectively track Bing keywords, use the Bing search ranking tool – Webmaster. This app offers insights into how your website is performing and how to rank higher on Bing.
Bing Webmaster Tools offers powerful features not found in Google Search Console. These include the Bing SEO Analyzer, a comprehensive Bing keyword research tool, a website diagnostic tool, and malware detection features. Typically, such capabilities are only available through third-party SEO tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, or SEO Toolkit. And by the way, Bing Webmaster supports integration with third-party tools too!
Bing Advertising: Leveraging Bing Ads
Using Bing search engine marketing opens up a vast range of ad distribution options from Microsoft’s global array of outlets for internet advertisers. You can choose which single or cluster of ad venues you want for your Bing ads. Run the Bing or Microsoft Publisher Performance report to see how location and language targeting impact who is seeing your ads. Then, adjust your distribution settings in the Microsoft Advertising Editor:
- In the Data view, select the Ad Group you want to adjust.
- In the Edit view, go to the Ad Distribution drop-down menu.
- Change your selection on that menu.
- Choose to display your ads on:
- “all search networks” or
- “just Bing and Yahoo owned and operated sites,” or
- “just Bing and Yahoo syndicated search partner sites.”
If you don’t want your ads to be displayed on websites that are not generating results you can deselect those.
Don’t forget to leverage Microsoft Ads Tag (also known as Bing pixel) to properly track the performance and results of your ad campaigns. This pixel will let you see the complete journeys of the e-commerce customers who clicked on your Bing ads.
Local SEO on Bing
Bing SERPs include local sources for products or services, and other types of organizations if they appear to be highly relevant to the user’s search criteria:
- Bing Local SEO – Website owners whose purpose is to reach local target markets must focus on Bing SEO for their local markets to ensure that their businesses receive the exposure they need to compete effectively in their communities.
- Listing in Bing Places – Get an optimized Bing local business listing using Bing Places. If you have an optimized listing, when some reviews are added, you can receive a listing.
- Claim Your Bing Business Listing – Bing probably already has a listing for your company and displays it when local searches for your business type occur. To boost your placement on such local search results, you can simply go to Bing and claim your business’s listing.
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Bing SEO Tips: Challenges and Solutions
There are some common issues and corrective measures you can take to work with Bing. By resolving these possible issues to bring your site’s ranking up to the first Bing SERP, you can maximize the visibility of your business’s website and other web assets.
> Challenge: Your website is too new, so Bing has not crawled it yet
Solution: This is a common issue for new websites. To help the Bing bots locate your site, submit your sitemap or page URLs to Bing via your Webmaster options.
> Challenge: Your website doesn’t seem to have been indexed by Bing
Solution: Bing limits its index to web pages it assesses as acceptable search results. If your website does not appear in the results of queries that you test, check to see if any of the issues and corrections below apply.
> Challenge: Bing does not index your website due to the low quality
Solution: If necessary, you may need to improve the quality of your web pages to remedy problems that make them too deficient for Bing to index. Issues such as slow pages, poorly behaving graphic or photo elements, copied content, low-quality links, and other issues can lead Bing to decline to index the pages.
> Challenge: Your website has been deleted from the Bing search index
Solution: In unusual cases, Bing identifies violations of its quality guidelines, or malware on a website and removes the affected site from its index. The Bing Indexing API is available to help site owners recover access to reenter the site into the index. Or, you can contact Bing to request help with faster reentry into the index.
Bing SEO Guide: Takeaways
Optimizing your website for Bing can substantially increase your site’s organic traffic. Knowing the factors Bing uses to determine the relevance and quality of a website will help you see what you need to do to optimize your site’s functionality and content to raise your rank.
SEO for Bing is very similar to Google, so it’s not much more work to take full advantage of your opportunities through both. But, as you’ve seen, there are differences between the two ranking systems, and you’ll need to give that extra attention to Bing SEO to rank ideally.
Optimize for Bing, to broaden your reach across your target market and drive a higher volume of organic, high-conversion consumer traffic through both Bing and Google!
Frequently asked questions
Improve your Bing ranking by optimizing meta tags, using exact-match keywords, focusing on high-quality content, enhancing user experience, and earning quality backlinks. Regularly monitor performance using Bing Webmaster Tools and adjust strategies accordingly.
Bing values exact-match keywords, social signals, and older domains more than Google. It also places greater emphasis on meta tags and descriptions as well as factors the social media performance of the content.
To increase traffic from Bing, optimize your website with relevant keywords, high-quality content, and ensure mobile-friendliness. Utilize Bing Webmaster Tools for insights, focus on local SEO, and encourage social signals. Regularly update and promote your content for better visibility.
There are many free and low-cost resources online to guide you through the basic Bing SEO process. Use Bing Webmaster Tools for comprehensive SEO support. It offers keyword research, SEO Analyzer, site audits, and backlink analysis. For additional help, refer to Bing's SEO guide and community forum.
To achieve international SEO for Bing, use hreflang tags to specify language and region, create localized content for target markets, and register your site with Bing Webmaster Tools, setting the geographic targeting in the settings. Ensure fast loading times and mobile-friendliness globally.
