14 DAY TRIAL // Businesses can now control the information returned in Bing local search results to users by simply claiming their own listing with Microsoft’s search / decision engine. The Redmond company unveiled the replacement of Bing Local Listing Center at the start of this week, informing that any existent LLC listings will find their way to the new Bing Business Portal.
For the time being, the Bing Business Portal is available as a Beta release, and can be leveraged only by businesses in the United States.
Microsoft is not charging customers that use the Bing Business Portal or any of the tools offered as a part of the service.
Since taking advantage of the decision engine’s portal dedicated to businesses is free, customers have no excuse not to try it (it starts with claiming a listing either by phone or through snail mail.)
But at the same time, the new Bing Business Portal is about so much more than just creating a listing. Bing is providing a set of tools that can be put to good use to enhance a specific listing and ensure that any users that find the business through Bing can be transformed into customers.
“Once you’ve confirmed your identity as the owner of the business listing, you can add more details such as: photos, a logo, parking availability, languages spoken, holiday hours, payment types accepted, and select categories for your business to appear in. You can even add links to your Website, Facebook page, and Twitter URL,” revealed Andy Chu, Director of Product Management, Bing for Mobile.
Business owners can manage listing details via the profile editor, upload relevant images, edit specialties, add extra categories and key words, and even set up deals and promotions via a special wizard provided by Bing.
“With Bing Business Portal you can easily create a discount coupon, promotion or rebate. Using the Deal Editor, you can specify an offer category, a type (dollar amount, dollars off, percentage off, etc.), add information describing the offer (photos, expiration, disclaimer, etc.), and then promote the offer on Bing search results, your business listing page and Facebook page – all for free,” Chu added.
Since search is no longer an experience reserved for the desktop, the Bing Business Portal enables customers to tailor content to mobile devices.
One illustrative example is related to businesses that put together promotions through the Bing Portal. Not only will the deals be easier for users to spot in the Bing desktop search results, but the Bing for Mobile browse homepage (m.bing.com) will also highlight them in the deal tab.
“Once you have created your deals, again you can publish them to your existing business page on Facebook,” Chu said.