Do you have your own small business website? I can guarantee Google will be your largest source of organic traffic. However, I can also take an educated guess that you largely ignore every other source of organic traffic when Google dominates such a large portion and all you have to do is submit your website to free tools such as Google Search Console and Google Analytics right?
Well after Google, Bing will be your second highest source of traffic for one pure reason… Bing is expanding! As of January 2016, Bing now powers both Yahoo’s and AOL’s organic search results so it doesn’t matter if Bing generates as little as 10% organic search traffic, now is the time to stop ignoring alternative search engines such as Bing.
Inside our latest Web Grower Article, our Cheshire web agency highlight why you should submit your website to Bing Webmaster Tools, along with comparisons and differences between Bing & Google so you can make the most of your website.
Keyword Research Tools
Similar to the Google Adwords tool, the Keyword Research Tool is located in the easy and convenient location of the Reports & Data tab. However, what makes Bing Keyword Research Tool unique is the fact that it is the only search engine tool based on organic keyword data.
By filtering keywords by language, region and date (going back 6 months) Bing offers an instant insight into how often your chosen keywords appear in search based on the selected date criteria along with recommending a few suggested keywords. Although it may not have the power of researching keyword history from anything more than 6 months, it’s a lot better than Google Search Console as Google offers a completely different service in keywords.
Detailed SEO Reports
Based on a set of approximately 15 SEO Best Practices, Bing Webmaster Tools generate automatic SEO Reports every other week and will be available to access under the ‘Report & Data’ section in the navigation menu.
Similar to our WPG Reports, the SEO Analysis Reports breakdown some recommended SEO actions by ranking them on High, Low or Moderate Severity and the number of pages the issue appears on. By clicking on an individual SEO Suggestion in your list, Bing will provide a break-down of the issue in a detailed SEO Analysis Detail page where they explain the issue in more detail and offer an example of how the page should look with implemented SEO best practices.
GEO Targeting
Although Google do offer GEO targeting through Canonical URL submitting, Bing Webmaster Tools offer a much smoother process in GEO Targeting. Although this will not apply to most websites, if you have a pages structured to show content in other countries, GEO targeting allows you to easily submit pages for a specific country or region.
The major difference between the two is the flexibility. Where Google only really allows you to submit GEO targeting at site level, Bing offers allows you to submit GEO targeting on specific landing pages, country specific directories or subdomains you register in other countries (for example Untitledtm.nl) would be registered to the Netherlands. You have GEO targeting control on…
- Domain Level
- Subdomain Level
- Directory Level
- Page Level
Mobile Friendliness Test Tool
Following in the footsteps of Google almost exactly one year later, Bing introduced their own Mobile Friendliness Test tool in November 2015. Easy to locate in the Tools & Diagnostics section of your Bing Webmaster Tools dashboard, the free report is based on the following criteria
- Viewport configuration
- Zoom Configuration
- Content Width
- Readability of Text
- Spacing of Links and other content
Although Bing offer a much easier location having belt the testing tool into the dashboard, the Test My Site testing Google offered by Google offers a much more, friendly and in-depth review.
The Conclusion
Hopefully you now have a better understanding of Bing Webmaster Tools; this will not persuade to choose one service from the other. In fact, I’m suggesting the complete opposite! I would highly recommend submitting your website to both search engines so you can get an alternative perspective from two free, yet powerful search engine tools to better maximise your website’s reach in multiple search engines.
If you are an existing client or if you would like your local Cheshire web design agency to help run through Bing Webmaster Tools and submit and index your website for you, you know what to do!