Report: Bing Ads Gains Market Share In Q1

Efforts by Bing Ads to increase click volumes and gain market share from Google appear to be paying off, according to a report by The Search Agency.

The Search Agency’s Quarterly State of Paid Search, released today, shows Bing’s share of spend rose 3.6% year-over-year to 21%. The market share grab comes after four consecutive quarters of a relatively stable split between Google and Bing.

Bing spend rose 42% driven by a 7.4% increase in CPC year-over-year and a 46% increase in CTR year-over-year. Google’s spend increased 17.1% year-over-year.

Bing’s clicks increased both year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter, at 32% and 15.8%, respectively. Google’s clicks increased 9% year-over-year and 7.9% quarter-over-quarter.

“Bing has been ferociously working to grab market share from Google,” said Keith Wilson, vice president of agency products at The Search Agency.

These findings echo RKG’s Q1 Digital Marketing report. That agency also reported a year-over-year increase, 53%, in client spending on Bing Ads. RKG attributed the increase in large part to moves by Bing Ads to broaden its ad matching.

Not surprisingly, The Search Agency also reports both Google and Bing saw increasing click share from smartphones and tablets. Bing Ads benefits from being the default engine on Kindle devices. However Bing’s volume is still dwarfed by Google, the default search engine on iPad, iPhone and Android devices.