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Is Bing still relevant for SEO?



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Is Bing still relevant for SEO?

Bing is one of the web search engines and it's owned by Microsoft. It's available in 40 languages. Google obviously controls the large majority and is the most popular choice for SEO. But I've been reading some articles recently. They are saying that Bing's market search share is actually growing faster than Google's which is interesting to see.

Google is still at around 63.8% and Bing at 21.6% so they are nowhere near them but still.

I'm curious what's your opinion on Bing's current state and relevancy in SEO. Let's discuss Is Bing still relevant for SEO?

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TommyCarey
Well just a few years ago Bing was sitting at like 10% to 12% so I would say they are growing pretty quick Is Bing still relevant for SEO? Some people will say "That's only a few percent, Google is still king!" but what they aren't factoring in is Bing Ads Is Bing still relevant for SEO? Your ads over there will give you a bigger bang for your buck and if you start using it now you can figure it out and be a pro for when Bing starts to get a bigger market share.

I wouldn't be surprised if Bing hits 40% in the next 5 to 7 years. I say this because it seems like Bing is "for the people" and they're more friendly than Google. Google just seems like a massive corporate system that's in it for the money unlike when they started up from within a garage lol.

As for SEO, I still optimize for Google because if Bing wants to be competitive they will have to follow what Google is doing until they because a market leader. So in short, if you're doing everything right to rank in Google you will naturally rank in Yahoo! and Bing Is Bing still relevant for SEO?



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Christopher100
Yes Bing is growing consistently but not so fast as compared to Google, Google is still best for SEO and if our site is at first page of Google then we can create a lot of traffic and if we have some sale pages then we can make a lot of sales too.



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vinaya
It is true that Google is the most used search engine and you will have to optimize your contents for Google because it has the largest market share. However, there are other search engines as well. Bing is next to Google, you should try to optimize your content for Bing as well. And then there is baido, the Chinese search engine. You will have to consider Baido as well. Interestingly, if you optimize your content for one search engine, it will work for other search engines as well.



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JonathanS98
To begin, as an individual, I've only used Bing when their reward program for using their search engine was worth my time. Other than that, I've always looked at them as the minority when it comes to search engine options. Also, even though they're seen as "for the people" I've never found their search engine user-friendly (maybe it's because I'm dumb...).

You are right, however, they have grown in traffic over the past couple of years. Google is the king (and isn't going anywhere, anytime soon). But I still feel Bing plays a factor when calculating your search engine optimization needs.



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overcast
I think on Microsoft based services, we are forced to use Bing. So any Windows based laptop will have the Bing option. Anyone can use the search engine they want. But overall one has to find where does the most traffic comes from. So based on that I'd say not to ignore the Bing search engine. And let the users decide if they are coming either way, Better to optimize for it too.



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keen2write
I have recently started using bing as It seems my sites seem to rank more better there then google . As google is the top site so it will be a lot harder to rank for. Bing as a lot to offer they also allow you to earn rewards with them so bing as a lot to go on by. Do think bing will be more popular soon as seen a lot of more and more people using bing.



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MariaC
I've heard from friends who use it to promote their sites that it still has some reasonable percentage of visitors and thus, you can get enough exposure to double your advert cash. I don't use it though so take my opinion with a pinch of salt.



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itommy
All my sites are verified with Bing webmaster tools and I could track traffic and submit sitemaps to it.
I also have more keywords are ranking good on first pages of Bing and from their analytics I knew I have a bit more traffic came from these keywords on Bing search engine results.



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Pixie06
We also have the Bing Rewards now and maybe this can explain the reason why many users are now using Bing. However most people still use Google and it will take a very long time for Bing to overtake Google. Maybe if the Bing Rewards were not restricted to only those in the US many more people would have switched to Bing.



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itommy
Still getting good traffic from bing because I have a few keywords on top search results there.
So I think Bing is still relevant for SEO and it will help your site improve traffic if you have high keyword rankings there.



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kgord
Most people I know use google. I think Bing is popular but it still has a long way to go to be in the same category as Google. I just think it is one of the engines that may gain in popularity but I would stay with Google for now. However, a high keyword ranking will help there I am sure.



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Corzhens
Let’s admit that Google is the giant in the search engine industry but Yahoo Search and Bing are still there. I think Bing is getting noticed now mainly because of the Bing Rewards. That’s a cool promo to increase the number of users to this site. To be honest, I have checked on Bing Rewards when I saw the advertisement. It’s nice to earn when you are doing what you are usually doing especially with the use of search engines. Unfortunately, Bing Rewards is not available in our country.



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Jeane
As @Tommy points out, for Bing to deliver search results which those who use their search engine will like (meet their standards of what relevant search results are), they have to study and do what Google is doing. Technically you could be killing two or more birds with one stone.

So though in the past there were things you could do to get better rankings in Bing's SERPs, you need to compare them (those SEO strategies) with Google's guidelines and opt to follow the latter. Why? Bing takes a really long time to index newly published content so even if you optimize your content for Bing it will take a really long time before they send you any traffic.



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