A Week In Digital
Bing Launches their TV Advertising Campaign
Microsoft’s search engine, Bing, is attempting to wrest market share from the dominant Google – by launching a UK ad campaign.
The first of the three planned ads was broadcast last week, and it plays on web users’ experience of ‘information overload’ by conjuring up a vision of a simpler, more easily-searchable web. This is all part of a very large Marketing campaign that is planned for Bing in 2010. The advertisement can be viewed here.
Google Creates ‘In-Stock, Nearby’ Mobile Shopping
One of the things discussed at Google’s Search Evolution Event was mobile shopping with real-time inventory information. Now Google has announced that the product is live. Google is working with a limited number of retailers for the time being but is inviting others to apply to become part of the program. There are data quality and location quality requirements that Google identifies and links to and from its blog post. Product Manager Paul Lee said it is only on mobile for now but eventually would make its way onto the PC. He said that this offering made the most sense, in Google’s collective mind, for people on the go who had an immediate need for an item.
Google Is Bing’s Fourth Largest Referring Site
Google is Bing’s fourth largest referring site according to Hitwise. The top five are MSN, Facebook, Windows Live Mail, Google and Yahoo. MSN is obviously there because it is a Microsoft portal. Bing is the default search engine for Facebook, Windows Live Mail is another Microsoft property so again no surprises there but Google, its number one competitor is number four! This is mainly due to two reasons; Bing buys ads on Google, to drive traffic from Google but the most interesting and also most relevant to the launch of their TV ad, when people see an ad for Bing on TV, they will Google the term “Bing” and it will display in the search results.
Google Adds Bike Directions To Maps
Last week Google announced the inclusion of bike directions to car, public transit and walking directions options on Google Maps. According to Google Maps’ Shannon Guymon this was one of the most requested missing features on Google Maps. The new bike directions also provide a new view on maps one that is more “bike friendly” and emphasizes some features while de-emphasizing others (e.g., freeways, busy roads).The directions and underlying data to support bike directions come from Google’s Street View effort as well as selected third parties that have already mapped biked trials.
