5 Ways Bing Remains Relevant In A Mobile-First World

2020 is the year of mobile. As was 2019. And 2018 (you get the picture). Whilst it’s a repeated refrain, it’s not untrue. Based on Statcounter data, in the UK the majority of browsing is done via Mobiles and Tablets, exceeding desktop this year.

As you would expect, Google dominates overall browsing habits, particularly on Mobile. Bing’s touted market share often contains a caveat that it is comparing Desktop to Desktop, ceding an even greater overall advantage to Google. However, Bing remains a vital tool to search marketers across every device.

So how does Bing remain relevant?

One thing that hasn’t changed, is the value of appearing on Bing. CPCs through Microsoft Ads are still typically cheaper than on Google Ads and can provide real value. Additionally, there will be people who use both Google and Bing, or just Bing alone. Assuming budget is available, it would be wasteful to miss out on your target audience when they are making relevant searches. This is particularly true when running global campaigns – for markets such as North America, Bing’s market share is much higher than in the UK.

Although Mobile traffic for Bing is relatively low, it is growing – last quarter in the USA, 33% of paid clicks on Microsoft Ads came from Mobile devices. To take full advantage of this, Microsoft Ads provides the option of having Mobile-preferred creative. By adjusting messaging and CTAs for Mobile devices, you can bump up your CTR and make an impact in the SERP whilst competition and adoption is still relatively low.

Microsoft Ads Audience Network offers a suite of premium Display inventory to reach users across both Mobile and Desktop. Placements such as Outlook, MSN, and Microsoft Edge provide marketers with visibility, and combined with clever audience targeting, this offers a powerful solution for reaching the desired userbase across devices, outside of traditional search.

Demographic data for Bing routinely indicates that Bing’s audience skews older and higher net worth when compared to Google. Understanding your audience is key for any successful PPC campaign, so if this fits your targeting, then you should be taking full advantage to drive additional sales and revenue over-focusing on Google alone.

Microsoft’s ownership of LinkedIn was always an exciting proposition given the wealth of targeting data that LinkedIn Ads already offered. Integrating (at least some) of this targeting into search ads has added an additional layer of optimization that is particularly powerful for B2B advertisers.

As with any PPC campaign, the normal rules apply: understand you audience, understand your product, understand how to reach them.

Just don’t forget Bing.