Microsoft May Spend $100Million on Campaign For 'Bing'

[engine]

Microsoft May Spend $100Million on Campaign For 'Bing' [adage.com]

The software giant is set to launch an $80 million to $100 million campaign for Bing, the search engine it hopes will help it grab a bigger slice of the online ad market. That's a big campaign -- big compared with consumer-product launches ($50 million is considered a sizable budget for a national rollout) and very big when you consider that Google spent about $25 million on all its advertising last year, according to TNS Media Intelligence, with about $11.6 million of that focused on recruiting. Microsoft, by comparison, spent $361 million. Certainly Google has never faced an ad assault of anything like this magnitude.

JWT has been tapped for the push, which will include online, TV, print and radio. Another sign of the campaign's size: At a time when most agencies are laying people off, JWT added creatives on the Microsoft business last week.

[weeks]

Hmm. I seldom (i.e., almost never) check my rankings on Live.com. I don't get much traffic from them. Excuse me while I go take a look...

OK, back. Looks similar to Yahoo. I'm good.

Bing away!

[Syzygy]

Bing?

Client at ad agency meeting:

Hey guys, we need to come up with a name to knock Google out of the lexicon. We don't want people saying "I Googled this" or "I Googled that". We need something that's catchy, dynamic and inspired.

Creative director:

After much expensive research and brainstorming sessions on tropical islands with some of the most creative minds in the business we've come up with something that will knock 'em dead! Are you ready for this? I suggest you sit yourself down.

Client:

Great; I'm ready. Sock it to me...

Creative director:

Ok; here's the countdown. Brace yourself. 3... 2... 1... It's... BING!

Client:

Bing? What the... You guys can't be serious? It's crap. You mean to tell me that you've spend several million dollars and all you've come up with is the sound of a light bulb being switched on? You're all fired; I want my money back!

[trillianjedi]

All this renaming is a really bad start when the only thing you can compete with Google on is brand. Quality of the results for the most part is irrelevant now.

[rocknbil]

LOL @ Syzygy . . .

Bing

Keywords roasting on an open fire . . .
AdWords nipping at your nose . . .
Though it's been said many times, many ways,
Happy searching tooooo yoooooooooo.....

[Essex_boy]

Rocknbil: You should be arrested for that comment

[skibum]

They would probably do well to spend up to half of that on Google and Yahoo! It does help to understand the Internet and search in particular to when spending that kind of cash though.

Maybe just offering 50% cash back on anything you buy through Bing would get people to notice it and use it at least until the cash dries up.

Hopefully NY and other towns won't end up covered in the Bing equivalent of butterfly stickers.

What do they say in PR, it doesn't matter what people are saying about you as long as they are talking about you.