Thinking about SEO while also keeping in mind that Google is the dominant search engine, I have been questioning our in-class discussion on target market research, especially through specific search engine platforms. My thought specifically has been if there are select target audiences that use the search engine of Bing rather than Google. Now, there definitely are target audiences that do use Bing over Google, but is it necessary to try to reach them if Google is the safety blanket that covers almost all search engine users? I think it is necessary, but I also think that it depends on a few variables. Now, I am no expert, in fact I have very little experience with SEO, but I do know that it is paramount as a business to position their brand/ company well and SEO is an incredible tool to get into the minds of their target audience. One variable that comes to mind and is the one that I am going to focus on is whether the company is in a business to business (B2B) market. Thinking about the style of software’s that businesses use, it is very common for businesses to use Microsoft Office and if this is the case, this means that Bing is the search engine tied to those business accounts. So my thought is this: if I am a business selling either goods or services to other businesses, I would want to implement a SEO strategy that works well with Bing as well as with Google. Both Google and Bing have similarities in how they rank websites, but there are plenty of differences. I think there should be an intentional plan to make sure that the B2B website is friendly with Bing and not just Google. A note that I want to mention is that a company’s target audience could get even more intricate in study and for the team formulating the SEO plan, it is important for them to understand whether or not their target uses Bing at all. If Bing is not being used by their audience, their SEO efforts should simply cater to the only search engine that is being used that way they can better fit said search engines website ranking algorithm.
One Response
Hi Zach, I agree that companies who are using SEO need to be aware of where their target audience is searching. If they are optimizing their site of one search engine that does not have much traffic from their target marketing then it is a waste of time and effort. Companies need to know who they are and who their audience is. Great post! I thought is was super insightful.