Microsoft Ads

The reason this backdrop is necessary to begin with is to motivate for why now is the time to consider adding Microsoft Ads to your quiver of digital marketing, where before people scoffed at the small size of its market. That has categorically changed, and most notably so in the USA. Here below are some other reasons why it’s time to put some money in your monthly marketing budget towards Microsoft Ads.

First reason: market share is changing, and has been for years now. Where Bing used to get perhaps 1-3% of worldwide search, it’s probably closer to 5-10% now worldwide, and 10-20% for the USA.

Secondly, the ChatGPT, CoPilot feature is the best in market, and widely used – Google’s Gemini, and others are yet to compete with it. Said in another way: people are coming to the bing.com starting page with that intention, and doing either of the searches, or even both (standard search, or an AI-helped search).

Thirdly, it’s less competitive than Google, and a lot of your competitors are more than likely not using it yet. Best way to prove this? Think of your main three or four keywords, and search for them on the search engine. No advertising results? Well then it means it’s going to be you in first place! Which brings me to the next point…

Fourthly, when there is less competition, the price is always lower – I think this is Economics 101, and how any modern market works, but don’t quote me on that, I am no economist. However, there are multiple reasons I believe this. a) The reason I just stated b) Other industry experts say the same c) I’ve run campaigns for other clients and found this to be true.

Fifth, many company employees are bound to a Microsoft PC, and the software that comes pre-installed on their machines. I doubt all employers would prevent folk from using Chrome, and other software, but my guess is a huge proportion of employees just stick to the software that comes with their desktop – which is likely the latest version of Windows, bundled with Microsoft Edge. What is the default search engine on Edge? It’s Bing. sure, you can alter this, but I’d be surprised if the majority of folk do so.

And finally, the ratio of free credit or extra spend each offers. Google currently offers a deal where if you spend X they will give you 2X. So in South Africa it’s “Commit to R6,000, and once you’ve spent that, they will match it with R6,000”. In the USA, it’s “Commit to $300, and they match it with $300”. This does change from time to time, so don’t be upset if it’s different today. Bing and/or Microsft Advertising is currently offering a much better deal: they will match it 5X! There are three choices they give you: Spend $50, $250, or $1000 – and they will give you 5X that amount in credit. So coupled together that is $50+$250 = $300, or $250+$1,250 = $1,500, or $1,000+$5,000 = $6,000 – this is phenomenal value. They’re obviously offering this to entice people to experiment away from Google, which as things stand in search history, is a perfect time to do so.

There are of course other reasons, but the six above are enough to convince me that it is worth diving in, and keeping Google on their toes by giving Microsoft some of the usually-for-Google budget. More competition is only good for all businesses – I did learn that for sure in first year Economics at University – and so help your business, and the search advertising business in general through commiting today.