Whilst we’re all fighting for the number 1 spot of Google, we quickly forget about the other search engine. Yes Bing!
Whilst Google does have wolrd domination, for those not so in the know, it can be quite difficult to change things like a default search engine on their computer.
As of today, Bing has a 2.83% share of the global search market, on top of this Bing powers the Yahoo Search engine that shares 1.65% of the global search market. Are you really willing on giving up on 4.48% of search results?
Using Bing Webmaster Tools
Acting and looking very similar to Google Search Console aka. Google Webmaster Tools, the Bing version looks very familiar and is very easy to navigate.
Adding your site to Bing is just as easy as adding it to Google, add the URL, download the file or add the code snippet to verify and give it a few days to start collecting the information.
Bing accepts your sitemap from the outset and even asks you when the busiest time of the day is for traffic, this is so it crawls at the right time.
Search Performance on Bing
Just like Google, Bing clearly shows you the performance of your website against the results of both Bing and Yahoo.
You can use the information of impressions to clicks, rankings and keyword results to help build up a picture of your website.
Sitelink results
There are a few tools that Bing has, that Google doesn’t. These include sitelinks to what it feels are relevant parts of your website.
On Bing, if you feel that one of these links isn’t relevant, the system allows you to block specific individual pages from appearing in the sitelinks section.
Its a great way of dismissing irrelevant pages or articles.
Local SEO
Bing has the capability of allowing you to aim sub-domains or individual pages to a particular country or region, this is ideal if you want to push the Local SEO aspect of a site.
This is ideal for things like region specific listing directory websites or services that are only available in a particular area.
Link those Social Networks
Bing allows you to connect your social networking accounts and app profiles to your URL on Bing Webmaster Tools, something that requires a bit of coding and schema work for Google.
Doing this can help present your company and brand like one of the big boys.
Bing Index Explorer
Imagine looking at your website, like you would a series of folders on Windows File Explorer. Well this does exactly that.
The Bing Index Explorer shows you how it sees your website and presents it visually in an easy to follow image.
It makes it easier to find out everything Bing has collected about your website.
Bing isn’t Mobile-first indexing
Whilst Google has pushed the mobile-first indexing that favours mobile friendly websites over others, Bing has no plans to introduce this.
However, it is still really important to ensure that your website is responsive to mobile devices.
By not having a mobile friendly site, this could still deter the user to come off your website pretty quickly and go somewhere else, harming your rankings with both Bing and Google.
Bing and the 11+
Bing has an excellent tool that allows you to search for the keywords that you rank 11-20 on, you can utilise this data to help you get on to that important page 1 of Bing spot.
Go to the Search Keywords Tool and have a look to see which terms you are ranking on page 2 for and get some keyword work done.
Missed anything?
If you think I have missed anything on this article about Bing and its webmaster tools, then please do drop me a line. I write these articles for the love of writing and having SEO as an interest of mine.
