Bangalore: First, there was only Google, the six letter word which defined ‘search,’
and then came Bing, a strong competitor from Microsoft. Over the years,
both of them fought furiously, integrating breakthrough features, which
were once unimaginable to a search bar.
But the question still stands- Which is the best one, Google or Bing? The recent online commercials from Microsoft claimed that blind users preferred Bing’s results over Google’s by a margin of 2 to 1, while Google picturises itself as the most popular one.
Here is a breakdown of these search engines from speed to quality to social integration.
#5 Google Advantage: More Relevant Information
Google scores high in the quality of informative queries. Even though Bing has made some relevant changes recently, it’s not yet good as Google in qualitative and relevant results. For example if a person search for “income tax rates” in both search engine, Google’s Search Engine Algorithm would display information from 2012-2013 in top five results, compared to Bing which displayed a single listing, mentioning 2011 tax rates.
#4 Bing Advantage: Strong Social Integration
Bing is more social compared to Google’s search results. While Google try to push its not yet successful social network Google+ through the page, Bing’s contract with Facebook and Twitter gives it an edge in displaying more social data.
#3 Google advantage: Instant Search
While both search engines has instant search options tailored to it, Google cuts Bing behind with its more accurate predictions. The potential queries appears on Google’s search bar tends to provide more relevant results, more quickly.
For example, entering the same query: “latest Lakers score” required Bing to type it full, whereas Google till “Latest Lakers.”
#2 Bing: More Attractive Result Pages
Google earlier had it- The simple pages with uncluttered results, which users liked. But then it began integrating features like “+1” buttons, social annotations and ads.
But, Bing travelled in the opposite direction, less cluttered results which have certain visual appeal, and many people like it.
#1 Google’s Trump card: Connected Products and Wealthy Information
Google has all its products connected- YouTube, Google Reader or Google+. So being a user of any of these products will bring a list of tailored information to your search results, which will be of more value to you. Moreover, Google over the years has acquired a huge pile of information.
Bing also has its products tailored, like the Bing reader. But its products are not yet as influential as Google’s and so it’s integrations are less likely to influence many people.
