Explainer: Bing Advertising for Apartments

Are you seeking a broader approach to advertising your apartments online? Bing may be the next place to look, and it won't take much extra effort to start.

Bing Advertising is a valuable outlet for apartment marketers seeking less competitive (and more affordable) places to highlight their communities online.

In this guide for marketing apartments in Bing, we'll cover:

• What are Bing Ads?
• How do Bing Ads work?
• Why should apartment marketers add Bing Ads to their current pay-per-click strategy?

What are Bing Ads?

Bing Advertising (or Microsoft Advertising) is a digital advertising platform on which marketers can target their intended audience by bidding for relevant keywords related to their products and services and showing text or display ads on the Bing search engine and across Microsoft's unique online network, including Yahoo, AOL, and DuckDuckGo.

Example of a Bing search ad.

How do Bing Ads work?

Say someone enters the search terms 'luxury apartments for rent in Shawnee Kansas' in Bing. 

Like Google, Bing will begin an auction to determine which digital advertisement will appear in the search results, factoring in the advertiser's bid, goals, and the ad's quality score.

Bidding

After marketers conduct keyword research to determine the search terms they want their advertisements to appear for, they set bids—or the maximum amount they would be willing to pay for a click. Keywords that an apartment marketer wishing to rank for the search term above would include 'luxury,' 'apartments for rent,' and 'Shawnee Kansas.'

Goals

In setup, an advertiser can select the goal of their Bing campaign. Do they want more traffic to their website? More conversions or calls? Most apartment marketers use digital ads to drive website traffic, as it's there where visitors can ultimately convert to a lead.

Quality Score

Bing Advertising is, first and foremost, a business. Its goal is to make money for Microsoft. To do this, Microsoft wants to ensure that a) any ad it shows in Bing or across its network is highly likely to get clicked and that b) searchers continue to come to its platform because they trust it.

That is why Bing's Quality Score calculation, like Google's AdRank, is used as a safeguard to prevent advertisers with the most cash from getting their ads displayed the most, which would cause other advertisers and online users to go elsewhere, hurting Microsoft's revenue.

Bing's Quality Score calculation (Source: Microsoft Help)

Bing's Quality Score calculation looks at an ad's expected click-through rate, relevance to the search, and the experience of the landing page (or website) to which it drives traffic. Ads can only be included in any search term's auction process if they score 'Average' or 'Above Average' in all three Quality Score criteria. 

Once the Quality Score is determined, Bing will factor in the advertiser's bid and campaign goal. 

Why? Bing knows displaying ads relevant to the search terms 'apartments for rent in Shawnee' will get more clicks, helping them make money while ensuring searchers get what they're looking for. 

If there were an apartment community 100 miles away that bids $10 for those keywords, Bing's Quality Score calculation would most likely prefer the ad featuring an actual community in Shawnee that bids $1 for the same keywords.

But if another apartment community in Shawnee bid $2 for those same keywords and its ads also have a higher Quality Score, Bing would show it instead. So, the bid amount does play a role in which ad 'wins' the auction, but relevance is the more significant factor.

Why should apartment marketers add Bing Ads to their current pay-per-click strategy?

1. Apartment marketers can import their current Google Ads strategy to Bing Ads.

In only a few clicks, apartment marketers can import their entire Google Ads strategy—from campaigns, ad sets, ad designs, keywords, budgets, bidding strategies, etc.—to Bing Ads. This makes setting up Bing faster and less stressful and creates a consistent look for an apartment community's ads everywhere they're shown online. 

Video: Import campaigns from Google Ads into Microsoft Advertising

2. Bing Ads provides a more extensive online platform to reach prospective renters.

Bing Ads are shown across Yahoo, AOL, MSN, Outlook, and other Microsoft-owned online platforms, providing apartment marketers more online reach outside Google's massive network. And though those other websites may not generate as much traffic, any apartment community that seeks to stand out in them will face far less competition, driving down ad costs.

3. Ties with OpenAI and other alternative search platforms make Bing more valuable as an apartment marketing source.

Bing's value is rising thanks to Microsoft's partnership with Open AI, which created ChatGPT. Bing leverages ChatGPT's models when formulating generative AI search results. Though there's no direct connection to Bing Ads, the early adoption of AI online and ChatGPT's influence cannot be ignored. Additionally, Bing Ads are displayed on a new, privacy-focused search engine called DuckDuckGo, which more online users are looking for as an alternative to Google. 

Conclusion

As digital marketing continues to evolve, leveraging platforms into less saturated online spaces beyond Google will strengthen their communities' visibility for prospective renters across the web. That's why incorporating Bing Ads can give apartment marketers a competitive edge. 

If you need help leveling up your apartment community's digital advertising strategy, including reaching renters through both Google Ads and Bing Ads, try implementing Predictive Advertising by RentVision. It's the most advanced and automated pay-per-click solution for multifamily, delivering qualified leads exactly when your community needs them.