Bing is a new search engine by Microsoft, replacing Live Search. It went fully online on June 5th and quickly jumped to the number two search engine, surpassing Yahoo, but in many searchers’ opinions, falling far behind Google. It has received a lot of “buzz” these last few days as people try its search capabilities. Initial reports put Bing at 16.28% of market share, Yahoo at 10.22% and Google by far the leader at 71.47%.
Obviously the most important attribute of a new search engine is the value of its results. Mashable.com reported on a blind test where searches were done without the usual branding and formatting so the users would not know which search engine they are using. After testing several keywords 44% of users favored Google, 32% preferred Bing, and 24% chose Yahoo.
Only time will tell if Bing has the capability to maintain its initial ranking if people are just trying it right now or if it has the power to one day surpass Google.
