3 Reasons Bing Ads are a Strong, Sneaky Performance Marketing Play

Imagine a bodybuilder who wants to improve his squat record. He spends hour after hour tirelessly working his quadriceps while neglecting every other muscle in his legs. After months of training, he has stronger quads, but the amount of weight he can squat only increases marginally. Why? Because improving overall strength means also training the other muscles of the leg to support the work the quads are doing.

The same principle applies to a well-rounded performance marketing campaign. For the strongest — and beefiest — pay-per-click (PPC) campaign possible, you want to devote your resources to all channels that offer the greatest amount of value.

Increasingly, finding that value means putting your eggs in more than just the Google basket and branching out to Bing ads as well. Here are three major reasons you should consider integrating these ads into your performance marketing strategy.

Reasons to Use Bing Ads in Your PPC Marketing

Reason 1: Bing is the Default Search Engine for Internet Explorer and Siri Voice

According to Netmarketshare, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) 11.0 has 19.27 percent of the browser market, with IE 8.0 and 9.0 claiming another 10 percent of the market combined. That essentially ties IE with Chrome as the most-used browser, and of course, the default search engine of IE is Bing.

With that much of an audience searching through Bing, you can’t afford to neglect this prime advertising space. Furthermore, the Bing Ads audience spends more and earns more on average than the general online audience, thus improving your chances of a click.

Since 2013, Bing also has been the default search engine for Siri voice searches on Apple’s iPhone. In the United States alone, there are over 100 million iPhone users, and more and more of those users are turning to voice searches. According to Timothy Tuttle of MindMeld, a voice interface specialist, voice searches in 2015 went from statistical zero to accounting for about 10 percent of all searches.

Reason 2: Bing PPC Ads Cost Less

Bing PPC ads with the same keywords cost less than they do on Google. You could say you get more “Bing” for your buck in that regard. Google ads for same keywords can cost two or more times as much as Bing ads. Of course, Google ads are still critical to any well-rounded campaign, but if you’re neglecting low-cost ads on Bing, you’re leaving potentially lucrative opportunities on the table. Additionally, sign-up for Bing Ads is free, you only pay when customers click your ads, and there’s no minimum fee.

Reason 3: Bing Ads Yield Excellent Performance for Mobile Search

Mobile is not only the future of search; it’s the present. In May of 2015, Google confirmed that more than half of all searches take place on mobile devices, not desktops. Given that reality, the search ads you choose have to leverage the power of mobile in getting your name out there.

Bing delivers superior performance in mobile search by building platforms specifically designed for the mobile-dominant world. Applied to mobile advertising, this enables brands to engage through various platforms, services, and screens.

Just as strength requires more than one muscle, a healthy PPC marketing campaign requires more than just Google. Bing’s growing presence, affordability, and strong mobile performance have all earned it a seat at the search table.

Diversification: The Name of the Game

At the end of the day, the key concept when it comes to leveraging Bing ads is “diversification.” Just like with a financial portfolio, a robust online marketing strategy has to be formulated to minimize your web presence’s exposure to any one specific asset or risk.

All LeadBuilder® performance marketing campaigns are optimized to achieve the highest amount of search visibility and the lowest CPC possible. These campaigns are engineered to be robust, and to take advantage of all the available tools to deliver consistent and meaningful outcomes.

Ryan Smith is a Digital Strategist at Mediagistic. He has nearly 15 years of marketing communications and digital marketing strategy experience, including 10 years of international marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) and social media marketing. Connect with him on Linkedin and follow him on Twitter.