We already knew that Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine was doing quite well, but today, Microsoft released its own data about the state of the service. Bing launched just a bit more than one month ago, and since then, we have seen reports from numerous third-party web analytics firms that Bing was indeed doing quite well. According to Microsoft’s own data, Bing saw an 8% growth in unique users in June compared to the previous month. The company also noted that the number of users who would be “likely to recommend” Bing to others doubled in June.
Shopping and Travel
In addition, Microsoft also announced that Bing Shopping saw a 300% increase in visits and Bing Travel saw its traffic grow by 90% month to month (though Bing Travel’s image is a bit tarnished by a recent controversy about its design).
Source: StatCounter Global Stats – Search Engine Market Share
Advertisers
Overall, the numbers Microsoft cites for Bing’s traffic compare well with data we have seen from various web analytics firms, so we have little reason to believe that Microsoft doctored them (though the latest data from Compete is slightly less encouraging for Bing). Microsoft, however, also detailed some data about the results advertisers are seeing on Bing, though we will have to withhold judgment here. It is hard to find hard data about this, and while Microsoft announced that TigerDirect saw its sales and order volume triple, and its conversion rates and average order size “increase significantly,” we just don’t know if this was a special case or something advertisers saw across the board.
Developers
According to Microsoft, developers are also taking a liking to the Bing API. The number of registered developers doubled last month, and incoming API requests are up 50% since launch.
What’s Next?
While Microsoft didn’t specify any exact numbers, the fact that far more users are likely to recommend Bing than they were likely to recommend Live Search must be an encouraging sign for the company.
Microsoft didn’t specify any future plans in today’s post, but we know that Microsoft’s biggest challenge is to overcome Google’s momentum and to keep users on its service and from switching back to Google.
