How to Create a Killer Microsoft Advertising Campaign

With over 724 million monthly unique searchers on Microsoft’s Search Network, Microsoft Advertising isn’t something to pass up. Microsoft search advertising, done through the Bing search engine, is a valuable strategy for helping you reach prospects where they search.

If you want to know how to get started with Microsoft Bing ads, you’ve come to the right place! In this post, we’ll go over everything you need to know about Microsoft Advertising, including:

• What is Microsoft Advertising?
• Microsoft Advertising vs. Google Ads
• How to launch Microsoft ads
• Tips for launching Microsoft Bing ads

Keep reading to learn more! And don’t forget to subscribe to Revenue Weekly to join 200,000 smart marketers who stay in the know of all things digital marketing!

What is Microsoft Advertising?

Microsoft advertising involves running pay-per-click (PPC) ads on the Bing, Yahoo!, and DuckDuckGo search engines. These paid ads help you target specific searches to reach qualified leads looking for your business. Microsoft ads appear at the top and bottom of search results and are tagged with the word “ad” to indicate paid content.

Microsoft Advertising vs. Google Ads

While Google reigns supreme in the digital ad space, Microsoft remains a close competitor and an excellent option for advertising your business to prospects who use other search engines.

So, how does Microsoft Advertising compare to Google Ads?

Here’s a breakdown of the similarities and differences:

Ad location

With Google and Microsoft Advertising, your ads appear in similar locations in the search results.

Google ads appear at the top and bottom of results.

If you run a Microsoft Ads campaign, your promotional content will appear at the top and bottom as well.

So, in terms of visibility, it’s the same for both platforms ­­–– your ads can appear at the top and bottom of search results.

Ad costs

The cost is the next aspect to look at when comparing Microsoft advertising vs. Google advertising. So, how much does it cost to run a Microsoft ads campaign compared to Google ads?

With both advertising options, there’s no set budget you need to run ads. While there’s generally a recommended amount, you could choose to run an ad campaign with only $500.

As for each platform’s average cost per click (CPC), Google’s falls around $1-$2 per click for their PPC ads. For Microsoft search advertising, the average CPC is around $1.54.

So, when looking at these two platforms, you can see that the average CPC is about the same.

Ad audience

When advertising on Google or Microsoft, you’ll want to consider your audience and how many people you can reach with your ads.

Nearly 4 billion people use the Google. About 1.2 billion monthly global visitors choose Bing to conduct queries.

So, while Google has a larger share of visitors that use their search engine, Bing still has over a billion monthly users you can reach through the platform.

Competition

When analyzing Microsoft search advertising and Google Ads, you’ll also want to consider the competition. When running ads on each platform, you compete against other businesses for your placement.

One of the downfalls of Google Ads is that the platform is extremely competitive. Considering that 80% of companies focus on Google Ads for PPC campaigns, most people turn to the platform when running their ads. It means that you’ll have more competition for your industry keywords.

With Bing, one of the upsides is that not as many businesses use it for advertising. Since many companies opt to only use Google, you have access to an untapped market that’s searching through Bing. It’s an excellent way to get better ad placement, so your business appears in front of more leads.

How to start with Microsoft Advertising in four steps

Running Microsoft ads campaigns is a great way to help your business reach people as they search on Bing’s search engine. So, how do you get started with Microsoft Advertising?

Here’s how you can set up your ad in four easy steps:

1. Create your Bing Ads account

To start advertising on Microsoft, you must create your Bing Ads account. You can do this by going to the Bing Ads website and clicking the sign-up button. If you don’t have a Microsoft account, you’ll need to create one.

2. Create your campaign

In this next step, you’re given two options.

If you already have a Google Ads campaign running, you can opt for importing data from those campaigns to speed up your advertising process on Bing.

When you choose to import your Google Ads campaign, you can determine what parts of your campaign you want to import, including your:

• Bids and budget
• Landing page URLs
• Tracking templates
• Ad extensions

If you aren’t running Google Ads or don’t want to import your data, you can select to create a new Bing campaign.

3. Determine your keywords

A key component of Bing advertising is selecting the right keywords. Your keywords trigger your Bing ads to appear in relevant search results.

You’ll want to conduct keyword research using a tool like KeywordsFX to help you identify relevant terms for your ad. You can also use the Bing Ads Keyword Planner within the Bing Ads hub to help you identify crucial keywords.

Like with Google Ads, it’s best to stick to long-tail keywords containing three or more words to ensure you’re reaching the most qualified leads.

4. Create your campaign

Once you’ve identified your keywords, the last step for starting with Bing advertising is to create your campaign.

At this step, you’ll:

• Choose your ad goal
• Add your Bing ad’s text
• Choose your URL
• Create your headlines
• Enter your selected keyword
• Choose your match type (broad match, phrase match, exact match)
• Set your budget

After filling all these aspects of your ad, you’re ready to launch it!

4 quick tips for launching successful Microsoft Bing ads

Microsoft Bing ads are a great way to get a leg up on your competition and help your business drive qualified leads that turn into sales for your business.

Here are four quick tips to help you see success with Bing advertising:

1. Modify your time zone

One of the unique features of Bing PPC advertising is the ability to set your time zone for your ads. If you’re trying to reach people across the country or even the globe, selecting the correct time zone is essential.

You may miss out on earning valuable sales for your business because you aren’t showing your ads at the right time.

Think of it like this: If you’re trying to reach people in New York and California, setting your ad to run at 7 a.m. EST means it’s 4 a.m. PST. Not many people in California will be awake and seeing your ads.

Instead, if you opt to run your ad at noon EST, it’s 9 a.m. PST, and more people on the West Coast will likely see your ads. You could set your ad for PST to ensure you’re showing your ads at a reasonable time for both time zones.

2. Spy on your competitors

One of the great features of Microsoft ads is that you can spy on your competition. Bing enables you to get detailed metrics on other websites in your industry and how their ads perform.

You’ll see data like:

• Impression share
• Average position
• Overlap rate
• Position above rate
• Top of page rate

It’s an excellent way to gain insight into how you stack up to your competition.

3. Use ad extensions

Like Google, Microsoft offers ad extensions to help enhance your promotion. You can use multiple ad extensions, including the:

• Sitelink extension
• Call extension
• Location extension
• App extension
• Review extension
• Image extension
• Callout extension

These can help you do everything from adding a phone number to your ad to including reviews to convince prospects to click.

4. Optimize your keyword selection

The last tip you’ll want to note for Microsoft advertising is to optimize your keyword selection. When you initially choose your keywords and run your ads, you may find that some keywords don’t perform as you predicted.

It’s essential to constantly review your keywords’ performance to see what type of results it’s driving. If you’re not seeing your desired results or achieving your goals, you’ll want to revisit your keyword and try optimizing for new ones.

Need help with Microsoft advertising?

Doing Bing PPC advertising is an excellent way for you to reach people who search through the Bing search engine. If you aren’t sure how to run Microsoft ads successfully, the experts at WebFX can help.

We have a team of over 500 paid advertising experts that know how to launch successful ad campaigns.

We’ve already helped our clients earn $6 billion in revenue and over 24 million in leads.

Ready to make money moves, revenue driver? Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist about our paid advertising services!