Google vs. Bing/Yahoo

[RB]

Everyone talks about SEO for Google but when our site is SEO friendly - does that mean it will move up the ranks in Bing/Yahoo too? If not, Bing/Yahoo can't compete with Google but they're not that far behind in search numbers. Why not optimize for Bing when you're entering a competitive industry?
Thanks

[Notspot]

Generally if your site does well in google it does well in bing / yahoo too. Although the numbers make it look like bing gets a fair amount of traffic, in reality, in the english speaking markets, google traffic far outweighs all the other search engines. Atm it is definitely worth optimizing for google and seeing the others as a nice side benefit. If anything look at facebook, twitter and the traffic from those kinds of sources before bing / yahoo.

I'd love to see a more even distribution across the search engines, it would make google less of a beast. It's fine if you're doing well but if you get a G penalty, are panda'd or whatever it can be devastating for a sites traffic even if you still have top positions in bing / yahoo (although strangely I have noticed bing traffic converts far, far better and have heard others say the same too).

[Michael Martinez]

Generally if your site does well in google it does well in bing / yahoo too. Although the numbers make it look like bing gets a fair amount of traffic, in reality, in the english speaking markets, google traffic far outweighs all the other search engines....

Actually, doing well in Google doesn't mean squat for doing well in Bing/Yahoo!

Bing drops listings that users don't click on, so most sites have far less coverage in Bing/Yahoo! than they do in Google -- hence, they get far less traffic from Bing/Yahoo! than Google.

If you're not actively monitoring and cultivating your Bing visibility and optimizing for Bing's users you're missing out on a huge chunk of traffic.

Up until March 2011 Microsoft allowed you to run a Bing site search tool on your own Website. All the traffic went through Bing, so the clicks kept your pages indexed in Bing. After Bing shut down the service they made an API available for Webmasters who want to continue using Bing site search. However, the API just serves unBinged URLs so Bing never sees the clicks.

I was receiving over 2,500 visitors a month from Bing/Yahoo! until the site search service was taken offline. Since then I have received fewer than 200 visitors a month from Bing/Yahoo!.

My index coverage in Bing/Yahoo! took a huge hit when I redesigned my site as well.

I have yet to come up with an attractive way of getting content re-indexed in Bing and keeping it there.

[parttimepoker]

Bing and Yahoo are nowhere even close. They are that far behind.

If you have a lot of extra time on your hands, optimizing for Bing is fine (Yahoo uses same engine, right?). That said, there are 100+ things I would suggest using your time on before I'd get close to talking about Bing.

[pokerprop]

<3 Yahoo!
But really focusing on most areas google is all you need. However rank well in blekko | spam free search and you'll get tons of traffic from ISPs who merge their results either on their own or via countries where search.com is what's preinstalled when purchasing new machines. The first step to this though is working on Google anyways.

Is a TON more than you can do by being diverse, keeping idea big, but in the early going most should focus on Google. WAY down the road from now (like WAY WAY WAY) If you're not looking for small tricks with the other engines you're leaving big money on the table. Bookmark his for when the time comes. The best way to do this is hub content specific to countries and choosing ones where 1) you have a site to promote and 2) google is secondary (or even better #3) in market share for that areas search volume here you can optimize those pages for a different engine. Again for now, Google all you need to think about.

[Prenut]

nevermind.