Microsoft and Yahoo! have just received regulatory clearance to join forces in creating more balance in the search engine space.
As previously announced on this blog in July 2009, the partnership is positioned so that MSN/Bing will control the technology side - driving paid and algorithmic results for both platforms - and Yahoo! will maintain the majority of the sales and service relationships.
The self-proclaimed Search Alliance could really shape up as an interesting battle. Since its inception, Bing has become the fastest growing search engine (mostly at the expense of Yahoo and AOL), and industry leaders have always felt that Yahoo's estimated 2.5 billion US searches per month could be better monetized with superior technology.
The announcement from Bing said the integration goal for the US is "prior to the crucial holiday season" with a staggered schedule for other countries in 2011. Here's hoping that they pull off this widescale integration with no hiccups, as a large snafu in the middle of the busy holiday season could be painful for retailers.
The Bing announcement also mentioned that it is "business as usual now" and there is no change to your account or service. However, we recommend doing the following to make sure that your campaigns are prepared when integration is complete:
1. Open an adCenter Account
Some advertisers spend 100% of their time and budget on Google. If you are one of these advertisers, open up a Bing account today! MSN usually offers up discounts for new advertisers, so we recommend you try to dig up a promo code.
2. Mirror Campaigns
Launch your whole Google account on Bing! Many advertisers launch on Google, planning to launch campaigns on Yahoo! and Bing later, but never do. Make sure that you push all of the work you have done on Google over to Bing to ensure that you have equal coverage on both engines.
3. Stay Abreast of Developments
When the integration is complete (late 2010), make sure you understand exactly how the two platforms are going to appear in adCenter. Our data shows that Bing has a much better ROI than Yahoo, so you should make every effort to manage these two properties separately. Similar to the Search Network/Content Network for Google Adwords, make sure that you keep these two different types of campaigns separate if possible.
Check out a quick video clip about the Search Alliance:




