Microsoft Advertising is easier to test than you think, especially as Google Ads campaigns can be imported as copies and trialled carefully.
Google Ads is usually the default choice for search advertising. That’s understandable: it has the biggest reach by far. Many of us already have well tested campaigns there, and the landing pages are in place. So when we’re reminded about the alternative, Microsoft Advertising, our reaction is often: “Do we really need another thing to manage?”
But that may be the wrong way to look at it.
For many advertisers, Microsoft Advertising is not a new search strategy; it’s more like an extension of the first one. Microsoft has spent years making it easier to import campaigns from Google Ads, and its recent product updates continue that pattern. The company has announced, among other things, that even Performance Max campaigns with new customer acquisition goals can now be imported from Google Ads into Microsoft Advertising.
There will still be work to do. Imported campaigns should not simply be switched on and forgotten. Budgets need checking. Bids, locations, conversion goals, match types and exclusions need checking. But it’s not the same as building a new advertising account from scratch.
And there is another reason to look again. Microsoft Advertising does not only mean Bing. Its search ads can also appear on Yahoo, DuckDuckGo, AOL, Ecosia and other search partners. Many people use these alternative search engines without knowing they’re part of a Microsoft advertising network.
For B2B advertisers, that hidden reach can be interesting. We are not always chasing mass consumer volume. We are often looking for smaller numbers of better-qualified searches. If Microsoft Advertising delivers fewer clicks but at a useful cost, that may be perfectly acceptable.