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Bing Is For Doing Things It Tells You Not To Do

Danny Sullivan on June 12, 2012 at 3:04 pm

“Bing Is For Doing” is the catchphrase being used in new ads for Microsoft’s Bing search engine. But in a bit of irony, one new ad literally suggests jumping off a cliff but then warns in small print, “Do not attempt.”

I first saw the ad on Sunday when watching the Mad Men finale and again while watching a show on Hulu yesterday. It starts with “Kevin Cook” using the new social features in Bing to ask friends for any recommendations to do in Hawaii:

Along comes his friend Neil Black who suggests jumping off a cliff. OK, a big rock, though some of the videos he links to call it a cliff jump:

Kevin clicks on the link to get a list of videos right on Bing that tell him more about the place to jump:

That link, by the way, doesn’t work for me. Nor can I figure out any way to get a page like you see above. Bing Videos doesn’t host content as with YouTube, so you can’t have a page of your own uploaded videos as seems to be appearing in the ad.

Postscript: Mystery solved! Bing emailed me to say that this type of page appears if you share a link from the results. So if you found a video in Bing, then shared that link through Bing, you’d get to a page like shows in the ad. In fact, here it is.

But back to Kevin, who does a search for “hawaii flights” on Bing and is on his way. Friends keep telling him about cool things to do, such as hidden trails and to try spicy poke. Eventually, however, his date with the cliff jump arrives. Here he goes!

The red arrow is my addition. It’s pointing to a “Do not attempt” warning. Yes, “it’s amazing what you can do when your friends are part of your search,” as the ad says at the end, when it shows the “Bing is for doing” tag:

Just, you know, don’t attempt the things those friends on Bing suggest that you should be doing.

I’m guessing some lawyer got a bit freaked out after the ad was shot. I do like how the ad spends time highlighting some of Bing’s features. I always like search ads that do this. But that “Do not attempt?” I’m still chuckling over it.

Here’s the ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-FwaCz4yZ0

About The Author

Danny Sullivan

Danny Sullivan was a journalist and analyst who covered the digital and search marketing space from 1996 through 2017. He was also a cofounder of Third Door Media, which publishes Search Engine Land, Marketing Land, MarTech Today and produces the SMX: Search Marketing Expo and MarTech events. He retired from journalism and Third Door Media in June 2017. You can learn more about him on his personal site & blog He can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.