Some very interesting revelations have come about in the last 24 hours that really makes a difference in this growing battle between Bing & Google and a confirmation of the business love affair between Facebook & Microsoft.

1. BING Drops a Social Nuke
In Its War with GOOGLE
©2009, Oracle Digital

2. Here I am again, reflecting on some meetings with clients during the week and I find it
interesting that two potential prospects I have met with this week have both asked me
the same question –
―Is Google the only place you optimise our website, and what is this Bing all about?‖
Considering these are only bricks and mortar business owners with very little knowledge
about our the online marketing world, it obviously means that people are beginning to
become aware of the Microsoft creation called Bing which is arguably an outdated and
very sloppy excuse for a search engine. Some very interesting revelations have come
about in the last 24 hours that really makes a difference in this growing battle between
Bing & Google and a confirmation of the business love affair between Facebook &
Microsoft.
The Mechanics of What Bing has done
The joining of hands between Facebook & Bing is quite well documented amongst us
professionals in the SEO game. If you conduct a random search in Facebook, then scroll
to the bottom of the results page you will notice that you have a series of listings that
have been delivered into Facebook via the Bing search engine. So this was just the
beginning, a slow drip feed of Bing into the Facebook world but now they are stepping
it up – and seriously!
In a make or break move, Bing has declared that it is totally re-shaping its search
algorithms to integrate with the powerful social data available on Facebook. Essentially
this means an entire change in the way it delivers its search results (long overdue some
would say).
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3. In a statement released by Microsoft they said the following –
―The best decisions are not just fuelled by facts, they require the opinions and emotions
of your friends. Search is now more than a fact finder — [In this update] we’re
marrying fact-based search results with your friends’ street smarts to combine the best
data on the Web with the opinions of the people you trust the most and the collective
IQ of the Web.‖
Just some of the amazing data they will analyse & insert into their algorithms will be
things like:
Friends ―Likes‖ – Seeing which of your friends have liked or advocated a website
in the search results
Personalised Results – Meaning priority results will be given to you based upon
you own ―likes‖, hobbies & those of your friends also.
Collective IQ – Meaning, when you are researching it might analyse what you are
missing in your search to find something and then pick up those missing pieces
by integrating data from your friends off Facebook to help deliver you results.
After all, we do often turn to people we know and trust when we are looking for
things.
Businesses & Website Owners Opinions – It will deliver the voice of businesses &
website owners to display their social interactions in the search results.
Universal ―Like‖ Button – By installing the improved Bing toolbar searchers can
now Facebook ―Like‖ any website they wish. This seriously helps out under
privileged webmasters.
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4. The Shift in Search Market
Well for several years it has been the biggest acknowledgement of the modern day
business era watching Google rise to fame in such a short period of time, overtaking
Alta Vista and Yahoo being the dominant and powerful search engine leaders of the
90′s. Well, interesting to note that while Google still holds the lion share here in
Australia with a 95% piece of the search market action our benchmarking allies in the
USA have seen a major shift in recent times with bing.com taking over more than 30%
of the USA market in April, 2011according to Experian Hitwise.
What it means for businesses around the world?
Well the message to business owners is quite simple! We have been preaching from the
rooftops for over a year now about the era of social advocacy. It is more important now
than ever that you begin to promote your business on social networking websites
around the world. Facebook welcomes you in with opening arms, allowing you to
promote your business for free. With bing.com continuing to take large chunks of the
search market share, and their announcement of the new social driven search
algorithms you are left with no other option but to embrace a social media strategy for
your business!
Update: Feeling a little red faced and bare bottomed, Google has yesterday embarked
on a worldwide PR blitz announcing the global launch of its social search feature. It is
not ground breaking news that Google has been developing and trialling it’s new Social
Search feature however it’s probably fair to say that in this case their arch enemy Bing
has certainly beat them to the chase.
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5. With the matrimony between Facebook & Bing you must seriously question the ability
of Google to win the race for socially driven search results. I say watch out for Bing and
start planning for the next generation of search engine leadership.
Let us not forget – Bill Gates & Microsoft (the owner of Bing) have been at the helm of
software technology, controlling the majority of desktop screens with their Windows
Operating System since before Google was even a twinkle in the eye! What do you
think?
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