A look at Bing Rewards

Today Bing announced its next big move in hopes of competing with the search engine giant Google; Bing rewards. Similar to other credit card and grocery reward programs, users can now earn points simply by downloading the new Bing Bar. As Bing describes it, “Become a member of the Bing Rewards Preview and experience the benefits of doing what you love to do online — learning, discovering, exploring — while getting opportunities to earn credits towards great rewards. Learn how to find information faster, discover new topics of interest and make more informed decisions.”

The Bing bar will keep track of your points and also give you the latest information about Bing, their products, and Bing’s world of search. Credits can also be redeemed for Microsoft Points, gift cards, and given to charitable foundations. The Bing bar keeps track of your reward credits and offers you opportunity to get more credits by showing current Bing offers. Some other ways to earn points include setting Bing as your homepage or trying new Bing features. While the Bing Rewards preview does not articulate exactly how users will obtain points, it does stress you’ll “earn great rewards while doing what you always do online.” Currently, the program is set up to give one credit for every five searches conducted.  In conjunction with this, the Bing redemption center has a multitude of categories with free shipping. Some of these include digital downloads, electronics, movies, games, music, computers, movie tickets, and even Bing gear.

The real question is: how will this compete with Google? Will users be persuaded to use Bing? I think not. While it may generate more searches through Bing by users currently using the search engine, I doubt it will take away from the “Google it” instinct that most online searchers have. The biggest disadvantage (or mistake) is that in order to use the Bing Bar you must have a Windows Live ID. Furthermore, Microsoft eliminates a wide cross section of searchers by deciding that the Bing Bar can only be used with Internet Explorer. That’s right- no Firefox, chrome or Safari.

This rewards program was generated after the closure of Microsoft’s previous program, Cashback which offered cash rebates for online shoppers who bought products by searching on Bing. According to pcworld.com, the rewards program was an idea from Bill Gates. “[Bill Gates] often spoke about the idea of giving people a reason to use a particular search engine.” Perhaps online users will be more prone to use Bing with their new rewards plan. The bigger issue is that this new feature of Bing shows Microsoft is not ready to hand in the towel to Google, and they will continue to try to add value to their services in hopes of gaining more market share. According to Nielson, Bing has already grown by 30% over last year (13.9%), and with the Yahoo acquisition, it will continue to climb.

Bing’s rewards program has not officially launched yet and is still in the preview stage. Once it is available for everyone, will it engage users, and motivate them to change search engines and use Bing? It’s hard to say. Sure rewards, gifts, prizes, and incentives are a driving motivation for everyone. However, I’m not sure if that incentive really provides enough value for me personally to download a new bar, switch internet browsers, and even use PC’s. Only time will tell what happens with Microsoft’s new innovations. For now, I’ll continue to Google on my Mac in my Firefox browser.