It’s peak season over at nexus-security – yearly revenue report time! We aren’t the ones thrilled about it though; the search giants all published their yearly revenue reports earlier this month. If you haven’t caught the excitement, you can find all the important details here for Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!. A quick look shows positive results for all 3 companies, but Microsoft takes the cake, boasting a 23% year-over-year increase in search advertising revenue.

Bing and Yahoo’s reports highlight the impressive growth of Bing Ads this past year. Bing secured 19.7% of the US search market share, while Yahoo experienced a 10% rise in paid search clicks year-over-year. Although both are still trailing behind Google, they are making headway in areas where Google Ads (previously Google AdWords) has been faltering – Google’s paid search clicks have actually dropped 11% from the same period last year.

Bing Ads must be onto something, which begs the question: what is Bing doing differently? Surprisingly, Bing Ads offers advertisers several key advantages that Google simply doesn’t.

1. Bing Ads has lower competition and more affordable CPCs.

Many small and medium-sized businesses treat Bing Ads as an afterthought, but they should reconsider. Bing Ads operates on an auction system similar to Google Ads, so advertisers on Bing benefit significantly from the reduced competition, including better ad placement and lower costs per click. We found that almost all of our marketing services clients advertising on both Google and Bing enjoyed lower search CPCs on Bing, with an average 33.5% lower CPC on Bing. Not only were these clicks more affordable on Bing, but their ads often secured better positions than their Google counterparts, resulting in higher CTRs.

2. Bing Ads provides more granular control at the campaign and ad group level.

Bing allows you to set different time zones for different campaigns, a feature absent in Google Ads. This makes managing complex ad scheduling strategies much easier in Bing, especially for campaigns targeting international audiences.

In Google Ads, settings like network, location, ad scheduling, language, and ad rotation are managed at the campaign level, limiting ad groups to inherit those settings. Bing Ads, however, extends these options to the ad group level, letting you quickly modify settings for a specific ad group without the need to create an entirely new campaign.

3. Bing Ads has superior device targeting capabilities.

Google faced criticism from the paid search community in 2013 when it mandated the switch to enhanced campaigns, where campaigns automatically target all desktop, tablet, and mobile devices. While users can adjust bids for mobile devices to some extent, this control isn’t available for tablets, and opting out of targeting desktop searches is not possible.

However, Bing plans to remove some targeting options in March, Bing advertisers can still exclude desktop and tablet traffic from their campaigns. Advanced advertisers can even target mobile devices based on specific operating systems:

Beyond offering more robust mobile targeting, Bing also allows you to modify your bid for tablet users from -20% to +300%:

4. Bing Ads offers greater transparency and control over search partner targeting.

Google presents paid search advertisers with a binary choice at the campaign level: target Google search only or target both Google search and search partners. No middle ground or alternatives exist. You cannot target search partners exclusively or exclude specific ones, nor can you identify which partner engines are driving traffic to your site.

In contrast, Bing provides users with the flexibility to target Bing & Yahoo only, search partners only, or both, all at the ad group level:

Furthermore, Bing allows you to generate a report to pinpoint which search partners are directing traffic to your site. Simply navigate to the reports tab and run a “Website URL (publisher)” report for a clear view of your traffic sources:

If any findings raise concerns (like an $82 CPA on msn.com!), you can exclude that specific search partner without abandoning all other partner sites. Just return to campaign settings and add the website as a “website exclusion.”

5. Bing Ads doesn’t impose close variants.

Google essentially phased out exact and phrase match keywords as we knew them in August by enforcing a previously optional “close variant” matching target on all Google Ads accounts. This change broadened the reach of these keywords by an estimated 7% by incorporating common misspellings, plural forms, and grammatical variations. Although it affected a small fraction (~3%) of SMB accounts, the response from paid search experts was overwhelmingly negative.

While Bing provides the option to include close variant queries, it remains just that: an option. Advertisers have the freedom to enable or disable close variant matching at the campaign or ad group level:

6. Bing Ads offers superior social extensions.

Bing started experimenting with automated social extensions in late 2014 by showcasing an advertiser’s Twitter follower count alongside their ad:

In contrast, Google’s social extensions display your Google+ followers – a well-intentioned feature, but Google+ lacks widespread adoption.

7. Bing Ads allows control over search demographics.

While Google Ads empowers us to monitor and manage demographic targeting on the Google Display Network, it leaves us in the dark when it comes to search. Currently, Google offers no demographic-based targeting options for the search network.

Arguably the most innovative and underutilized feature of Bing Ads is the ability to manage which gender and age demographics see your search ads. Demographic targeting can be controlled at either the campaign or ad group level within Bing Ads.

Users have the power to adjust their bids based on MSN users’ gender and age range, from -90% (effectively minimizing reach to that audience) to +900%. This type of demographic targeting is particularly impactful for advertisers aware that their product or service is primarily purchased by a specific gender or age group.

Bing Ads offers a range of unique advantages for SMBs that Google doesn’t (yet!). To optimize your Bing Ads account, try our new Bing Ads Performance Grader to identify quick and easy ways to reduce wasted spend and attract more high-quality traffic.