We got used to the word "Google" and "Yahoo!" Now, apparently "Bing" is set to enter our lexicon.
PC World is reporting that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will announce their new search engine, reportedly named "Bing" (which was codenamed Kumo) today at he Wall Street Journal's D: All Things D conference.
Google has 65% of the search market share, and Yahoo! has about 20%. Microsoft wants a piece of this pie. They made an attempt to buy Yahoo! for around $30 Billion, but that didn't hasn't panned out. Now on to Plan B:
Microsoft hopes Bing will help it grab a big slice of the online ad market.
They're launching Bing with a reported $80 million to $100 million advertising campaign. That's on top of Microsoft's current $300 million+ ad spend. Compare that to the $25 million Google spent on all of its advertising last year (source: TNS Media Intelligence)--but then again Google has always dissed the idea of advertising, and marketing in general.
The folks at Advertising Age say that they hear that the ads won't go after Google, or Yahoo by name. Instead, they'll focus on planting the idea that today's search engines don't work as well as consumers previously thought by asking them whether search (aka Google) really solves their problems. That, Microsoft is hoping, will give consumers a reason to consider switching search engines, which, of course, is one of Bing's biggest challenges.
From Advertising Age:
Ad agency JWT is creating the campaign, which reportedly will include online, TV, print and radio.
