Is Advertising on Google or Bing Better?

It’s not uncommon to immediately think of Google when it comes to the online world. I know if I am searching for anything I go to Google. But, did you know Bing is owned by Microsoft, which also owns Yahoo and AOL? When you advertise on one, you are actually advertising across all 3 search engines.  So how do you decide which is better – Google or Bing?

No matter which search engine you go with, the idea of advertising is the same. Both allow for pay-per-click (PPC) which helps target an audience, drive them to your website, which results in increased revenue.

Advertising on Google can be one of two types of advertising:

1. Search Network Advertising is where targeted Text-Based Ads are created at the top and bottom of the Google Search Result Page (SERP).
2. Display Network Advertising uses the same principle as the Google Advertising Network (AdSense) but display ads get created and displayed across a number of websites.

As mentioned above, with Bing, you can actually do PPC across all 3 search engines. A 3-for-1 deal sounds great, no!?

Let’s break it down even further.

1. Display Ads: you know when you’re doing a search and you see a title with a URL underneath? That’s what’s called a Display URL. Bing will bold this URL, whereas Google does not.
2. Description Text: this is what appears under the URL and describes what the user will see if they click the URL. Both, Google and Bing allow for up to 80 characters.
3. Keywords: Each has its own keyword tool, but you will find traffic volume is much larger on Google.
4. Click-through Rate: Bing does better with this for any eCommerce and financial services because there are more resources available.

Just because Google has way more people using its search engine does not mean Bing should be ignored. Bing’s users are growing each year. Not to mention, there are millions of searchers reached that are not reached with Google Ads.

According to Radd Interactive “It is no secret that Google dominates the search engine market, meaning they have a much larger search volume and larger reach.” As of October 2021, Google had 86.64% of the worldwide search engine market share, while Bing only had 7%.

Radd Interactive says “Although reach is significantly lower on Bing, you should not write them off as not worth your investment. “

Deciding which is best for you doesn’t need to be challenging. The obvious answer will be whatever brings you the most. You may want to try both to see what drives the best results. You may find that both help your business.