After Microsoft launched Bing in 2009, everyone was aware that it it had a long road to become a sizable competitor to Google’s search engine. While it still has a ways to go in regards to percentage of search users, Experian Hitwise believes that Bing is more accurate than Google for searches. Both Bing and Yahoo! (which is powered by Bing) sent a user to a site over 80 percent of the time over the month of July. In comparison, about 2 in every 3 searches on Google resulted in a user clicking on a search result. It’s clear that Bing and Yahoo are more successful at sending users to the right places than Google.
These new figures can work to Microsoft’s advantage when selling keyword-services on Bing. With a proven higher click-through rate, they can compete in quality over quantity. However, Google still controls the amount of searches on the Internet at a sizable 66 percent. Twenty-eight percent of searches come from engines powered by Bing and the remaining six percent are from much smaller competitors. Seventy-two percent of Bing traffic comes from Internet Explorer users as the default search engine for the browser is Bing. Search terms ranging five to eight words or more increased slightly from June to July while one word searches still comprised the majority of searches, specifically one in four.
Bing has consistently been a money pit for Microsoft to the tune of millions of dollars. However, the company recently laid out a long-term plan for the service that includes a desktop app, web apps and increased Facebook integration. Microsoft officials pointed to stronger HTML5 usage in web applications specifically designed to work with the Bing search engine. The desktop application will be somewhat similar to Google Desktop, but with stronger ties to Twitter and Facebook for social messaging.
