In the last article on ‘How to make SEO for other search engines’, we have learnt the importance of other search engines like Bing for your website. Now it is the time when we should learn how to give this a shape!
We have learnt that Bing stands as the second best search engine and has reached to a search market share of 20 percent as Yahoo Bing Network (YBN). While most of the websites still want to optimise for Google, Bing gets less competition automatically. So, there is a great chance you website will rank higher in Bing due to this fact.
So, if you are all set, let us move forward! The first step is to understand the rules of the game. Bing has set certain rules and regulations which are required for every resource which is trying to get on top of the Bing Search results.
First, look what Bing prefers?
The keyword choice has to be clearer and Bing demands-
- Clarity
- Readability
- Relevance in Content
- Regular updates
If you observe these rules and enrich your website considering them, you can surely improve your rankings in Bing search results.
Bing gives preferences to the locals. The most important factor which influences your ranking in Bing is the preference given to the local resources. So, if your website is remote geographically, then you will get low rankings in search engines than the competitors who are nearby.
Age of your domain – Bing considers the level of trust and the audience loyalty to your website. That is why it prefers the age of your domain which means the older, the better!
So, these were the preferences on how Bing prefers the activities of different resources on the web. Let us have a look at the process of optimising your website on Bing.
Let us understand the process of optimising your website for Bing
The good news is that many of the best practices for optimising your website for Google hold good for Bing also. But still, we need to understand the methodology of optimisation which is peculiar to Bing in many cases.
Using Bing Webmaster tools – Similar to Google, Bing also allows you to use their free Webmaster Tools to help you learn about your website’s presence on the web. Bing Webmaster tools can help you to-
- Submit URLs
- Ignore URLs
- Verify ownership
- Geo-target
and use other tools to configure your website.
With Bing Webmaster tools you get reports for your website including Page Traffic, click through rate, search visibility and average position on Bing. The other reports include a list of inbound links, keyword in searches, crawl information and techniques for on-site optimisation.
Diagnostics tools are also provided by Bing Webmaster. In order to find approximate search volume for a particular keyword in Bing, you can use Keyword Research tool. The Link explorer tool helps you in seeing backlinks to any URL and filters them. The SEO Analyzer tool provides a visible tour of your website to see on-site optimisation tips and suggestions.
Technical requirements you need – Bing focuses on the following technical points when it ranks your website. So be careful about them!
- Page Loading Speed- Loading of your website page should be faster
- Sitemap- Your website sitemap should be clean and updated. If any unnecessary URL is there, you should remove it.
- 301 Redirects- If you have moved your content between websites, use 301 redirects for the purpose.
- Canonical Tags- Bing now acknowledges rel= canonical tags which help Bing in determining which page is original and which is duplicate.
- txt- This file helps Bing Robots to understand what to crawl and what not to crawl.
Local listings – Bing favours websites whose local listings are well optimised. So be active in your local
Listings like www.bingplaces.com
Legitimate Backlinks – Backlinks are always important when search engine rankings are considered. In the case of Bing, they are equally important. A recent research has also shown that 50 to 52 percent of the backlinks of websites in the top 30 Bing results had keywords in anchor text. This is 10 percent more than Google.
But make sure that you create backlinks which come from legitimate websites.
Being socially active is what needed most! One major factor in reaching high ranks on Bing is being active on the social media scene. Your website should have many followers, likes and shares. To reach this out, you can take the help of Facebook, Twitter and Google+.
Create social media sharing buttons for all the major social networking platforms on your web pages. This will help to share your content easily and hence more likes and shares.
On Page SEO – Like Google, Bing also favours all types of on-page optimisation techniques. Make sure your website has all these-
- Proper Title Tag
- Description
- Meta Tags
- Alt tags for all images
- Heading Tags to separate text
- Targeted keywords for all articles
Before you write any content, focus on researching the proper keywords which are important in getting good ranks for some specific keywords.
Improve the navigation structure of your website – In order to facilitate the fast crawling of Bing bot, you should concentrate on improving the navigation structure of your website. The things which can help are SEO friendly URLs, site maps, faster navigation menus etc.
Using RSS feeds and XML sitemaps helps in ensuring that your content is indexed by Bing. FLASH and AJAX content are not recommended as Bing is not able to interpret them well.
Bounce Rate Reduction is important
One of the most important steps in Bing optimisation is the reduction of bounce rate on your website. Bounce rate is defined as the rate at which the website visitors leave your page after visiting only one page of your website.
- There can be a number of reasons for the site’s bounce rate-
- The website navigation is not good
- The visitors do not find good interest in reading your website
- Your website pages do not provide additional links where important information can be found.
Your website should provide unique and useful content which can link to some other exciting internal pages. Good content plus faster navigation can keep your visitors engaged all the time and the bounce rate will be decreased.
Final Words
Today, Bing has become the second most important search engine after the search engine giant Google. The popularity is growing and will definitely continue to grow in the future. If you rank well on this search engine, you will not only attract more organic visitors but you will also create a bright path for the future of your website!
