Bing is dead before it starts

[Quentin]

Today I have just finished my research on Bing.com, the new Microsoft search engine.

It seems no matter where you go everyone who reviews it talks more about the pretty picture on the front page more than the search results. Probably because the search results are so crappy.

I did a search for a number of different keywords and was surprised to see sites that I have not worked on for months and get little traffic get ranked way above my very popular sites which target the same keyword. (Yes I compete against myself)

Now this is good for me because these old sites might get a boost from Bing but in reality if they can't produce good quality search results people won't stay with them.

What is your thoughts and have you found the same?

[Johnathan]

I think Microsoft will (eventually) give google a bit of a run for their money. It may not be perfect right now, but they seem to be really 'annoyed' at the success google is experiecing, so if it doesn't take off, will try something different.

They do have an incredible amount of leverage though (i.e., hotmail.com) to promote their website.

Taking a cursory look at it -- it does appear that they've (essentially) copied google with a couple twists, and eventually it 'will' get better (the search results that is), because of a few search (usage) algorithms they've implemented.

[Intrepreneur]

I've found all of mt wbesites I currently own are at the top for their main keywords.

Hopefully that lasts as the user base grows.

[AverageGuy]

what is good search result? is there a definition?

the same result could be good or not-so-good to different people.

technically, google result is not much better than others. but, search engine is a money game. it is good microsoft uses its $ to fight google. as long as microsoft earns more $ than google, the fight is not over yet. maybe not bing, it could be cing, ding, eing, ...

david

Originally Posted by Quentin

Probably because the search results are so crappy.

I did a search for a number of different keywords and was surprised to see sites that I have not worked on for months and get little traffic get ranked way above my very popular sites which target the same keyword. (Yes I compete against myself)

[sbucciarel]

I don't like the pic on the front page. Doesn't look like what I expect a search engine to look like and it's distracting. As for the results, I haven't noticed anything out of the ordinary with the search results. Be interesting to see if it gives Google a run for their money. I think some real competition for Google would be a good thing. They've had a monopoly for long enough.

[The Villa]

I hope Bing eventually improves. Good competition can mean nothing but improvement for Google too.

[jessewrites]

After the initial buzz wears off, google will be king again. Just a guess, but a correct one

[Linda Van Fleet]

I noticed that MSN charges a $5 setup fee for advertisers on Bing. Have thy always done that?

[GarrieWilson]

Give it time.

It took Google years to get their engine where it is.

[wbakhos]

I've tried Bing.. and I'll tell you why I'm not impressed.

I types in "what is bing?"... and it couldnt tell me.

I had to go to Google do a search for "what is bing" to get a good answer.. that's a joke.

Not impressed with a search engine that can't tell you what it is!. but I will give it time nevertheless.

[sbucciarel]

I was just experimenting using Bing again and I performed a search and it asked for a captcha code to be entered. Said it wanted to make sure a person was performing the search. That did it for me. Thumbs down to entering captcha to perform a search.

[GeorgR.]

You are wrong AND right.

I observed what you saw...but i ALSO saw some of my sites which are #1 in Google not even appear on bing.

HOWEVER - here's the mistake:

You CANNOT compare bing or any other SEngine to google, otherwise you are (subconsciously) *assuming* that the Google search results are the "right ones" and every other result which differs from Google is "wrong".

If this were the case there wouldn't be a point in ANY other search engine.

You're basically saying: "Bing results differ from Google, therefore: Wrong!"

ANY other SE and any other competition for google is a good, good thing in many ways!

[hangtimenino]

i just tried bing.com, and i have to admit, it looks pretty, it didnt give me the feeling that i am in a search engine.
anyway, i tried searching for a keyword, that i searched previously with google, and the most obvious difference, is that the number of results. less in bing.com, and they were kind of old.

[Mark Coverdale]

Originally Posted by GeorgR.

You are wrong AND right.

I observed what you saw...but i ALSO saw some of my sites which are #1 in Google not even appear on bing.

HOWEVER - here's the mistake:

You CANNOT compare bing or any other SEngine to google, otherwise you are (subconsciously) *assuming* that the Google search results are the "right ones" and every other result which differs from Google is "wrong".

If this were the case there wouldn't be a point in ANY other search engine.

You're basically saying: "Bing results differ from Google, therefore: Wrong!"

ANY other SE and any other competition for google is a good, good thing in many ways!

I completely agree.

Google is Google. Google is not the internet.

[malcasid]

Originally Posted by The Villa

I hope Bing eventually improves. Good competition can mean nothing but improvement for Google too.

I completely agree. I LOVE Google and all, but having GOOD competition can only make Google better.

[yaji]

Let's keep an eye on it and see how it goes...

I don't like the front oage either but the search results have their own stuff there.

[makemoneygirl]

Originally Posted by The Villa

I hope Bing eventually improves. Good competition can mean nothing but improvement for Google too.

Basically, Google dominates nowadays and it is always better to have a better competition. I have check it out, and the huge picture on Bing frontpage really looks refreshing!

[Lawrh]

I agree with GeorgR that we must not allow ourselves to use Google to define what search results should be. However, unlike others who see themselves in nice positions in Bing, I don't!

In Google I have one page/keyword at number 4 and another at number 6. Neither are even in the top 50 in Bing. Thanks Microsoft!

[DavidO]

I love bing and I think it's search function is the most sophisticated and smartest out there. Here's why: My site places #1 for every one of my major keywords!!! I'm not even close for some of them in Google.

And there's more: My stats show a lot of visitors from bing and they're good buyers too!

Long live bing!

No, they don't stand a chance against Google for the time being but good competition can only be a good thing for the Internet.

[Intrepreneur]

Originally Posted by DavidO

I love bing and I think it's search function is the most sophisticated and smartest out there. Here's why: My site places #1 for every one of my major keywords!!! I'm not even close for some of them in Google.

And there's more: My stats show a lot of visitors from bing and they're good buyers too!

Long live bing!

No, they don't stand a chance against Google for the time being but good competition can only be a good thing for the Internet.

I've been thinking about this, why would all of my sites be there at the top while there are other sites at the top of google.

The more I though about it the more I understood a way in which Bing might have started off their Algorythm.

it probably didn't take them long to build, but they did it in a way that has ranked fresher content over old content..

Just a thought and has anyone else been thinking about how Bing works yet.. to see if you'd really want it to take over?

[talfighel]

This is the first time that I am hearing about this new BING site that Microsoft is running. If this is the case then I think that they need to advertise this in a lot of places on TV, radio, and everywhere they can think of.

I personally found out that I am getting some free traffic from them which is always good.

Can't wait to see if they take this search engine to the next level and compete with Google and Yahoo.

Tal

[Crappy Copy]

Well, I also have the same experience with some of my keywords. But I don't know if its any better? Most people are still searching using the Big G

[Bart Vyvey]

I think a lot of people will love this link:
Search Google and Bing at the same time
It's a site that offers you the possibility to compare Google and Bing on one screen.
Even better you can do it not only for the .com's but also for other country codes.
The whole list is on top of the page: .COM | .CO.UK | .DE | .TR | .FR | .ES | .IE | .NL
Have Fun!

[Lama]

Great Post Quentin

Well, I must say I only heard about Bing yesterday morning. I regularly check my main site stats thoroughly. I noticed Bing. It was on the top list of links from external pages, compared to nothing from bing previously. The stats are interesting so I will share some of them with you. Bing wasn't included in Browsers nor in Internet Search Engines. It was included in Links from external pages.

Anyhow, here's some of my stats that may interest you and help you with your research on Bing:

Last Update: 09 Jun 2009 - 10:51 Update now

Summary
Reported period Month Jun 2009
First visit 01 Jun 2009 - 00:00
Last visit 09 Jun 2009 - 10:47
Unique visitors Number of visits Pages Hits Bandwidth
Viewed traffic * 2750
3114
(1.13 visits/visitor) 10753
(3.45 Pages/Visit) 115716
(37.15 Hits/Visit) 1.46 GB
(490.51 KB/Visit)
Not viewed traffic *
1948 3067 65.94 MB

* Not viewed traffic includes traffic generated by robots, worms, or replies with special HTTP status codes.

Browsers (Top 10) - Full list/Versions - Unknown
Browsers Grabber Hits Percent
MS Internet Explorer No 91372 78.9 %
Firefox No 15503 13.3 %
Safari No 4243 3.6 %
Mozilla No 1514 1.3 %
Unknown ? 936 0.8 %
Opera No 911 0.7 %
Google Chrome No 769 0.6 %
UP.Browser (PDA/Phone browser) No 120 0.1 %
Netscape No 107 0 %
LibWWW No 61 0 %
Others 180 0.1 %

Links from an Internet Search Engine - Full list
- Google 1286 1298
- Yahoo! 881 881
- Unknown search engines 66 66
- AOL 44 44
- WebCrawler 37 37
- Ask 30 30
- Windows Live 28 28
- InfoSpace 11 11
- Dogpile 5 5
- MyWebSearch 5 5
- Google (Images) 3 4
- AT&T search (powered by Google) 2 2
- Tiscali 2 2
- Lycos 2 2
- AltaVista 2 2
- Earth Link 1 1
- SoSo 1 1
- Excite 1 1
- Voila 1 1
2408 50.5 % 2421 29.2 %

Links from an external page (other web sites except search engines) - Full list
- Bing 126 126

126 visitors from bing in the last 9 days, not too bad to start with

______________________________________________

I will continue to monitor Bing and share with you what I find.
I hope this information is helpful to you and other warriors.

Warmest Regards,
Lama Kalla

[sbucciarel]

Seems Bing is having a little porn problem
Microsoft offers unworkable solution to Bing porn | Larry Magid at Large - CNET News

[billythekid]

ive never used it personally. but will try it tonight, and post my initial impressions on it here. they've certainly got a tough task of steering people away from using Google. Much like Sentana did up against Sky, and look where they are today. Of course if it fails, no risk of Microsoft going under lol

[deskmonkey]

Bing is good only because of how it will push Google to improve their search engine even more. Well, maybe that's a little harsh. Actually, Bing provides very good search results. I did an informal test using the same keywords on Google, Bing, and Yahoo. Google's results were more relevant for me (the information I was looking for usually showed up in the top 3), and Bing wasn't close behind, at times giving me almost the same results Google did. Both did better than Yahoo, though.

The problem with Bing, as I see it, is that it's just as good as Google. Just as good as. Any marketer can tell you that if you want to really steal away the market share from the competition, you have to have a product that's better than theirs. What Microsoft seems to be doing with Bing is playing catch-up, much like what they seem to be doing with Internet Explorer to Mozilla's Firefox. Now, maybe Microsoft will manage to pull a rabbit out of their hat and offer something new with Bing... any bets that Google will top them almost as soon as Microsoft shows their hand?

Another hurdle Microsoft faces is branding. Google's brand as a search engine is so huge that it's practically a household name. People don't search the Internet, they Google it. Sure, they've had years to build up their name, but one thing that perhaps could have contributed to their success as a brand is the fact that they have a catchy, unique name. Bing, on the other hand, sounds so generic, so boring. I think Microsoft said they wanted a name that people from different nationalities could easily pronounce, but think they're shooting themselves in the foot by using such a forgetable name. What was the name of that website again? Ping? Ting? Oh, yeah, Bing.

[Michael Tracey]

I just checked and bing sent me 308 visitors so far this month. That minuscule compared to what I get from google, but yes it's a start and if it's extra traffic it's welcome

Michael

[InternetMarketingIQ]

It's far from dead. They have stated they will spend $100 million on brand awareness marketing.

They appear to be rewarding sites with tons of backlinks, and sites with deep pockets. The search results for my own portfolio are mixed.

I'm not going to dismiss them, but I don't see this as a Google Killer in any way. Microsoft still has an advantage as they are well known and trusted by the average joe.

Just look at the Laptop Commercials they are running... they have the attention of Apple who dropped prices on their laptops yesterday.

[Tyrus Antas]

I can't believe people are so negative about the only thing that can actually challenge Google's for dominance. Remember: more competition in the search space is good for us, specially when it comes to PPC.

I've been testing bing on and off and have had a good experience with it. Much better than live.com and about the same level Google is right now. I'm sure you could find better results on Bing than Google if you really wanted to.

Here's for more competition.

Tyrus

[deskmonkey]

Originally Posted by InternetMarketingIQ

It's far from dead. They have stated they will spend $100 million on brand awareness marketing.

I'd say that that is wasted money, but then again, who knows? They might be able to pull off a successful brand awareness marketing campaign, but I still think they failed from the get-go by choosing such a forgettable name for their new search engine.

Originally Posted by InternetMarketingIQ

I'm not going to dismiss them, but I don't see this as a Google Killer in any way. Microsoft still has an advantage as they are well known and trusted by the average joe.

Just look at the Laptop Commercials they are running... they have the attention of Apple who dropped prices on their laptops yesterday.

The difference between Bing vs Google and Microsoft vs Apple is that Microsoft's brand is strongest in the software and personal computers market. In their campaign against Apple, Microsoft was fighting from a position of strength. Google, however, is the undisputed king of the online world, and Microsoft will be waging a virtually uphill battle on Google's turf. Microsoft's brand also isn't as strong online. They lost the email wars to Gmail (vs Microsoft's Hotmail) and Yahoo. Live search was an abject failure that they had to scrap it and start anew. The MSN portal, well, I don't know anybody who actually uses it. Probably one of the only online services they have that's still going strong is MSN Instant Messenger. If Microsoft wants really wants to surpass Google and not just push Google to improve their own services, then Bing has to be much, much better than Google and it has to keep that lead.

[Tyrus Antas]

Originally Posted by deskmonkey

I'd say that that is wasted money, but then again, who knows?

This I agree. Google is a great brand, a great search engine but most importantly: an habit. People feel safe using it because that's what most of us have been doing for last few years. Habits are hard to break.

Tyrus

[Josh Anderson]

I used it once when working on someone's computer and for some reason my reaction was that I really did not like it at all and I immediately went to google.

I am a creature of habit but what really turns me off about MS is obtrusive advertising and those stupid popup ads when you accidentally hover over something.

I don't think they will be adding a new definition for the word Bing in the Oxford dictionary any time soon...

However, I prefer MSN as my home page and by default anyone using IE might notice how often that the focus of the cursor is forced to the bing search box resulting in a search on bing when you meant to type in the address bar.

Microsoft has huge market reach for browser and for operating system so you can bet this will drive use of Bing.

But for me the first thing I do to a computer when its new or when working on it for a friend is set the default search provider to google in IE and install firefox with the default search provider being google.

[HeySal]

I would think that they would WANT their SE to return different results from those of Google. If you get the same results, what is the point of not just using the same old same old?

IN the meantime - enjoy having your first place spots. That should make you happy, not aprehensive.
As far as a captcha code - it's about time that someone started putting up defenses against bots. They are being used to destroy way too often. Nothing wrong with human searchers.