Bing Watch . . . Just Bing It!

Rebranding issues

Internet critics continued to bashing Microsoft's messing around with its online business rebranding.  As Henry Blodget wrote: “…Several times since 2000, Microsoft has restructured and relaunched its Internet initiative, always with the same results…”

One example with rebranding is Microsoft online-maps consumer version, it was known as Virtual Earth since its launch in 2005.  This popular tool has been competing with Google Maps.  Virtual Earth’s consumer version was introduced as Local Live (with bird eye view and satellite maps), later renamed it as Live Search Maps, and it has now been rebranded Bing Maps.  Gavin Clarke of The Register wrote “a rebranding that's utterly pointless to anyone outside Microsoft's marketing team or those watching the company…”

Bing’s first 24 hours

Several brand experts and critics said about Microsoft choosing the name Bing: 

(1) Michael Cronan (brand consulting firm for TiVo and Amazon’s Kindle) said: “…It has a promise that you are going to find what you are looking for, and that’s great…”

(2) Peter Sealey (ex-Coca-Cola CMO) said: “…Bing has no equity; it signals nothing…”  “…It is going to be an enormous expense to create an image for this thing called Bing…”

(3) Greg Sterling (a search analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence) said: "…It's a strong first step or a new salvo for them, but it's not going to dramatically alter the market as it stands today…"

(4) Internet buzz word noted that BING is also an acronym of “But It’s Not Google”

Bing ads on Google

Microsoft Bing decision engine is starting to kick butt thru pay-per-click ads on Google site.  When you clicked on the ads, it linked to a “Coming Soon” landing page.  Microsoft plans to roll out Bing decision engine worldwide on June 3.

As reported early this week by AdAge, Microsoft is on track to spend near $100 million to advertise the Bing launch.  On average, Internet company usually spends about 25% of their budget on pay-per-click ads, which this means that Google could pocket close to $25 million from the launch.

Seeing Bing ads on Google

Bing…Bing…Bing...! the new search engine is finally here!

At AllThingsD conference near San Diego, California, Microsoft’s CEO Mr. Ballmer has publicly unveiled his company’s Google killer, a new search engine called Bing.com.

Bing.com is loaded with many new features, and some features are almost similar to Live.com search engine.  The extra added new feature is Powerset which provides quick previews with tiny screen of text.  Microsoft bought Powerset few months ago.

A full function of Bing.com "decision" engine will be available worldwide on Wednesday, June 3.

 

Bing.com Press Release

Brin vs. Bing

While attending a session at Google I/O Event today, Google co-founder Sergey Brin took questions on Google’s partnership with print newspapers.  Somehow a person asked what Brin thought of Microsoft’s Bing.com as the URL for the new search engine. 

Brin was quoted:

“…I don’t think I have great ideas for the name whatever Microsoft will announce. If I knew more about them, I’d have a suggestion. But we’ve been pretty happy with Google…”

Many attendees laughed at Bing

Bing.com search engine launch countdown . . . 3, 2, 1, and blast off!

The software giant is going to unleash its latest and renamed search engine within minute countdown, like the American space shuttle at launch pad ready to blast off.   The new engine should be unveiled shortly at the AllThingsD conference which starts on Monday (5/26) in Carlsbad, CA.  According several news sources, Microsoft may be giving Internet users a sneak peak showing Bing.com logo.

Bing.com logo

Bing.com search engine, let’s watch the software giant’s cheery picking season starts now!

Majority American cherry growers, include in the state of Washington, the home of the software giant, starts opening their farms for cherry picking season within days.  Similarly, Microsoft is ready with a new name which was chosen from a cherry farm for its new search engine.  Let's watch it!

The old search engine was known as “Live Search” since early 2006 launch day. It changed to "Kumo.com" (means: spider/cloud in Japanese) for internal use during a beta version within the past 12-months.  It’s now in a final product which will be called Bing.com (cherry).

According to AdAge.com, Microsoft is planning to spend around $80 million to $100 million campaign for Bing.com within days.

In the month of April ‘09, Microsoft controls about 9% in search engine market share compare to Google at about 64%.

Just Bing It! . . . a new cherry farm's search engine