Google Ads vs. Microsoft Advertising

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Google Ads
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Google Ads (formerly AdWords) is Google's pay-per-click online advertising program. With Google Ads users set their budget and choose where their ads appear in search listings, and on partner websites. Google Ads uses cost-per-click (CPC) bidding.N/A
Microsoft Advertising
Score 4.0 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft Advertising (formerly Bing Ads) is Microsoft's search engine marketing and advertising campaign management alternative to the popular Adwords, that, similar to its competitor, provides analytics and a management dashboard for running a pay per click (PPC) paid listing campaign. Microsoft Advertising features the ability to delimit advertising to particular responsive demographics and to intermittent times and days of the week. It also supports offline updates that sync later.N/A
Pricing
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Considered Both Products
Google Ads
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is more robust and has more features as compared to Microsoft Advertising, aka Bing Ads. Google has better and more reach than other search engines in the market. Google stands well against all its competitors when it comes to media planning and buying. Go for it any …
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads generally results in a much larger volume of users & available traffic. Generally, by comparison to other search engine platforms, the impression count, overall number of clicks, and impression share are much higher on Google as a result of nearly 65% of all search …
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is far superior. Google Ads generates exponentially more traffic and the UI is much easier to use. Bing Ads copies Google's user interface, but it always seems that this happens after Google is on to bigger and better things. Google Ads Editor is a much better …
Chose Google Ads
We have observed that the Bing Ads performs better than the Google Ads when we target the older audience. The cost per conversion is also better than the Google Ads on Bing because of low competition possibly. However, Google Ads is preferred by us mostly because of the …
Chose Google Ads
Our agency invests heavily in Google Ads (particularly paid search advertising) on behalf of our clients relative to competitors like Microsoft and Yahoo because Google is the top search engine in the world. Google collects the most search data which enables the company to …
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads clearly has high potential as more users search for their product when compared to other channels hence getting the desired audience.
Chose Google Ads
In most cases, it's better between features, usability, performance (though Bing can sometimes cost less). Google is also smarter about its keywords. Bing is more similar to how Google was five or more years ago (needing to add variations to those keywords). I will say, though, …
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is pretty strong when it comes to search and shopping campaigns. It's a great tool to target people who are ready to buy and actively looking for products we have to offer. On the other hand, Facebook has been a great tool for raising awareness, brand uplift, and …
Chose Google Ads
Bing Ads is an indirect competitor to AdWords, which does much of the same as AdWords (with a reduced level of detail) on Bing searches. We mainly used Bing Ads to complement AdWords activity, meaning, if we have saturated the market via Google, we will then use Bing Ads to get …
Chose Google Ads
Everyone uses Google. They have and will always be the leader when it comes to search engines. Not only was Bing Ads more difficult to use, but the results didn't even come close to what we were (are) getting from Google Ads. It also seemed easier to get support from Google …
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is bar none the leader in the space of the paid search industry. you will not find higher volume or budget or revenue delivery in any other vehicle in the space. Google Ads has great automation opportunities as well for those who like to spend less time in the weeds.
Chose Google Ads
Google is the most comprehensive search ad network of the ones I work with. They do well top of funnel too, mostly due to YouTube ads, but Facebook ads is great for that if you have good creative. AdRoll also has a good display ad network, but I've struggled to determine their …
Chose Google Ads
They stack up similarly except Google's reach is a lot more than Bing's. My current position has no Bing search enabled.
Chose Google Ads
I feel Amazon advertising is more for products, and we sold services. Microsoft ads were interesting, but the Bing platform did not have as much traffic as Google. Facebook ads focus more on casual relationships than business ones, so we spent more time and money on LinkedIn. …
Chose Google Ads
Google is easier to use and has more features. Google also has much more traffic than Microsoft/Bing, so research and performance is usually better with Google, however this may vary.
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads [(formerly AdWords)] is the king of search engine marketing. Though Bing (Microsoft Advertising) and Yahoo (Oath/Verizon) offer some competitive pricing and placements, there's no substitute for the sheer number of people you can reach with Google Ads. Because of the …
Chose Google Ads
There is no reason to compare. You use different programs to attract different types of users. You just need to balance your budget accordingly.
Chose Google Ads
Bing has nothing on Google Ads, the audience just isn't there. We have tried Bing for many clients and we can't spend the budget, because even if people are searching for the keywords, no one is clicking on them. It was a struggle to spend even a small test budget. I would say …
Chose Google Ads
For us, Google drives more traffic to our website and has higher monthly search volumes for most of the keywords we target. Therefore we tend to invest more in Google Ads. If your traffic isn't coming from Google, you should consider investing in other paid search offerings.
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is THE platform in the Search Advertising realm. They dominate market share and audience compared to any other platform. Although Bing can perform well, they just don't have the dominance in the marketplace that Google commands. If you want to capture Search …
Chose Google Ads
Google is by far the best search engine ad platform. Bing is a little bit cheaper, but it only has about 10% of the user base so you're quite limited. Google is pretty easy to use and they can provide you with an account manager to get you started, so it's a no-brainer to at …
Chose Google Ads
Getting in front of our audience, across multiple platforms, complements the ads we’re running on Google Ads. The online purchase funnel is more convoluted than ever. You might need to remind a consumer about your product 10-20 times before they purchase. You increase your …
Chose Google Ads
Bing provides a smaller market segment but it can be just as valuable of a spend.
Chose Google Ads
Google Ads is great in comparison to other search engine advertising, as most of the world uses google, so campaigning on other search engines isn't as useful or as high of an ROI, and other search engines don't display as relevant results, causing a loss in potential income …
Chose Google Ads
Bing Ads is simply the little brother to Google Ads. They operate in much the same way, and whatever we set up in Google Ads, Bing Ads makes it easy to import the exact same campaign and settings. Bing Ads is good for conversion rate, but we only get about 15% of the traffic in …
Microsoft Advertising
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Google Ads, as I've said before in this review has the scale that Bing Ads does not. However, as stated again, Bing is more efficient, meaning there is more return on ad spend through Bing. Google has no sync feature. So if you're ever going to use Google Ads, I'd recommend …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
We use Google Ads, Amazon Advertising and Bing Ads. Amazon has the best return for us by far, but Bing Ads outperforms Google Ads for us. Google obviously reaches many more people than Bing, but we are a traditional company working on MER/ROAS. We will continue to use Bing Ads.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads are often more cost-effective than Google AdWords, especially for small or medium sized businesses who don't want to spend a lot of money on advertising. If your business can't risk losing too much money on PPC ads, the Bing Ads are what we suggest rather then Google …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads is great in the sense that they know they are not as good as Google Ads. So what they do is allow you to easily import your Google Ads Campaigns into your Bing Ads account. They are the same exact product (or solution) just on different search engines but due to an …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads is like the step-brother of PPC platforms. It's there, people know about it, but it's a latter growth channel. Most paid media agencies don't bother with it as it's not as much of a revenue driver as Google Ads. As a result, time is prioritized on other paid media …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing is definitely most comparable to Google; in terms of audience sizes, it has about 30% of the traffic that Google Ads can drive; however, its costs are much more efficient, and this additional inventory is less competitive. Additionally, Bing has some features not available …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
In general, Bing Ads as an alternative to Google Ads is pretty weak. As mentioned, while it does have its use cases, many times these are limited as well. With Bing, it seems like there is always a large drop off in the quality of traffic versus advertising products, which …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Less cost than Google Ads but smaller audience. The interface is not as user-friendly and it is somewhat slow. The Bing Ads audience is smaller as they only have about 20% of the search market place. So you are limited by the number of searches vs. budget usually.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads is an excellent complement to Google Ads because most likely, it is reaching a different audience. Depending on where your traffic is coming from, one search engine may be better to focus on than the other.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads works similarly to Google Ads (Formerly AdWords) in the fact that it is search engine marketing. It differs in how it reaches a slightly more educated audience, has lower CPC (less competition) and often a better ROI. "Green technologies", solar, wind, etc. work …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
[Microsoft Advertising (formerly Bing Ads)] has access to superior traffic volume and ability / capability to spend ad dollars. [Microsoft Advertising (formerly Bing Ads)] is really the only paid search advertising option that competes with Google Ads in any capacity whether …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
It's a smaller market and different demographic, but CPCs can be lower so your ROI can be decent. Overall the interface feels a bit clunky and it's hard to find some features, but that may be because I spend most of my time in Google Ads.

We picked Microsoft Ads because it's …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Microsoft Advertising supports Google Ads integration, one of the efficient paid search engine extension. More so, Microsoft Advertising has a responsive, and informative live chat option, simplifying the customer help services. Microsoft Advertising supports conversion …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
The cost per click is definitely lower than Google Ads. But the drawback of it is that the audience size is smaller as well. The reason we picked Microsoft Advertising is that it is a good complementary solution to Google Ads. We use both of them with different budgets and we …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Because of duckduckgo we have to use Microsoft advertising and it turns out as the worst user experience given the company of this magnitude. Worst.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Technically, there is no comparison with the above systems - just a lack of features and a bunch of technical bugs.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
You have lower volume on Bing ads but the traffic is usually better and you get lower CPC with higher conversion rates.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Unfortunately, I don't think anyone has been able to properly and effectively compete with Google. They are the mammoth in the space - so therefore, I don't think either Bing or Gemini have had a fair shot to showcase their potential worth.
Again, I have found it very difficult …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Microsoft Advertising has more trustworthy and reliable keyword targeting, but the volume is much lower on Bing.com and related networks than on Google.com and related networks. The display capabilities and performance is lower on Bing as well. The import tool is easy to use …
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing Ads has a bit less traffic, however, its syndicated network is preferred because we can see where traffic is coming from. I would like to see custom mods for publisher sites to become a feature.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
As mentioned, it is overall more cost effective and you cannot afford to ignore all that Search traffic.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Google and Facebook both performed superiorly to Bing, which actually only took the money and didn't give even one single impression back. In short, it's a useless system with no regard for the paying customer.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
Bing is not quite as good as Google, but it is lightyears ahead of where Yahoo Gemini was. It's a fantastic platform if the client has enough money to support it.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
While we use all paid platforms (Google, Bing, and Yahoo before consolidation), Bing usually had the highest return on investment.
Chose Microsoft Advertising
I would place Bing Ads underneath Google in terms of return and ease of use. Currently, we use both, but if I had to choose I would put my budget on Google over Bing.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Ad Campaigns
Comparison of Ad Campaigns features of Product A and Product B
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Microsoft Advertising
1.0
2 Ratings
90% below category average
Ad campaign creation00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad deployment00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Display advertising00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad display and retargeting segmentation00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Sequence targeting00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Contextual advertising00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Social advertising00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Ad Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Microsoft Advertising
1.0
3 Ratings
86% below category average
Ad dashboards00 Ratings1.03 Ratings
Ad performance reports00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad conversion tracking00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad attribution reporting00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad forecasting and optimization00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Ad Auctions
Comparison of Ad Auctions features of Product A and Product B
Google Ads
-
Ratings
Microsoft Advertising
1.0
2 Ratings
0% above category average
Ad bidding00 Ratings1.02 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Small Businesses
Serpstat
Serpstat
Score 9.3 out of 10
Serpstat
Serpstat
Score 9.3 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
WordStream Advisor
WordStream Advisor
Score 7.0 out of 10
WordStream Advisor
WordStream Advisor
Score 7.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Score 8.8 out of 10
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Adobe Advertising Cloud
Score 8.8 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Likelihood to Recommend
7.1
(115 ratings)
1.3
(65 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.5
(21 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Usability
7.2
(7 ratings)
6.0
(1 ratings)
Performance
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.9
(8 ratings)
9.1
(11 ratings)
Online Training
9.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
1.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Google AdsMicrosoft Advertising
Likelihood to Recommend
Google
Clients who are selling products such as dresses, clothes, jewelry, beauty products, etc., generally work well. Also, in some cases, it doesn't fetch a good ROAS for very small business owners. If a client is already doing well in SEO, the probability for it to perform well over Google Ads is always enhanced, and if it doesn't have a good organic reach, Google Ads also suffers.
Read full review
Microsoft
Despite using our account for advertising with every other social media company, Microsoft flagged ours as fraudulent. After dealing with them for weeks, we finally got to a manager, who said that they didn’t know anything, couldn’t provide any information, and was unable to do anything about it. It seems odd, but it would flagger account every time we try to upload the campaigns from Google directly into their ad manager. I would suggest if you try and use their platform, don’t tell them you’re using Google cause they seem to have a thing against it. Once your account is flagged, they have no reasonable way of resolving it, nor they are able to offer any support. You’re better off to just try a different way. Ultimately, just don’t use Microsoft advertising if you can possibly avoid it. Hopefully soon DuckDuckGo will have their own advertising platform and we can eliminate Microsoft given the terrible time we have working with this one of many, social media platforms.
Read full review
Pros
Google
  • Keyword Research - Google Ads has a handy built in tool that helps determine important keywords to target both for Ads & SEO
  • Intuitive Analytics Dashboad - Google Ads makes it fairly simple to see and analyze important metrics on how your ads are running week after week
  • Intuitive Setup - Google Ads makes it easy to figure out how to run ads with little to no training (although training is highly recommended to run effective ads), as their interface is clean and easy to figure out (unlike competing products).
Read full review
Microsoft
  • Familiar interface, offers editor for bulk changes, adding negative keywords is much easier than in Google Ads
  • Nice reporting tools within the interface, detailed reports can be made fairly easily
  • Had very nice tools to help import/export ads directly from Google Ads, which saves a ton of time
Read full review
Cons
Google
  • If you don't know what you're doing, it will be a costly mistake. You need to target ads, and it is difficult the first time to do that.
  • There isn't a feature to run an add for a couple set date spans, just hours you want to run them or a single date span.
Read full review
Microsoft
  • Bing's ad platform could definitely use some improvements - it hasn't been updated in a long time, and it feels very outdated.
  • We feel that the optimization algorithms don't always perform as well for Bing Ads as they do in Google Ads (optimize for conversions, etc.).
  • It would be great to have even more integrations with LinkedIn audience targeting offered - right now, you can just make some bid optimizations in a couple of areas; we'd really like to get more robust options there, and maybe even things like cross-platform tracking.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
Google
I think Google Ads is good for getting your company out there and becoming more visible to potential customers in general. However, for specific product launches, social media advertising might be a better fit. Also, our user base is younger so social media is a better channel for our target audience.
Read full review
Microsoft
We have had good success with it over all of our clients. We continually recommend bing to reach "the rest of the searchers".
Read full review
Usability
Google
I suspect that Google Ads is not for the novice user. I told my 'Ad Specialist' that I was not the best on computers and apprehensive about my ability to maneuver the website. He told me on more than one occasion that "I work for you...I'm your sherpa...call me any time or send me an email"!
The sales and service representatives for Google Ads are very well trained, though not much integrity. Despite that I told my Google Ad Specialist that my website was incomplete the ad was published live anyway! Beware that the 'talk' is good, but it ain't cheap!
Read full review
Microsoft
Usability itself is all right, I just wish it looked better.
Read full review
Support Rating
Google
We have not yet had an account rep who hasn't tried to bully me or other employees to raise our budgets. At the same time, several years ago, one attempted to help refine our ads and ended up changing the ads to be something we were not affiliated with
Read full review
Microsoft
Our Bing Ads reps are very good and attentive. They've offered good recommendations and are quick to resolve unexpected issues and problems. Occasionally they have roped in technical support folks that have been friendly and helpful too. The general helpline for Bing Ads is also very good, especially when compared to Google's customer support.
Read full review
Online Training
Google
Daily use with advanced account structures. Familiarity with reporting/api and complex setups.
Read full review
Microsoft
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Google
Our agency invests heavily in Google Ads (particularly paid search advertising) on behalf of our clients relative to competitors like Microsoft and Yahoo because Google is the top search engine in the world. Google collects the most search data which enables the company to improve its AI to drive better performance for agencies and brands. As such, our paid search and app install campaigns always start with Google. If a client has a large budget, we will allocate media dollars to other search engines, but in some cases, the entire search budget goes to Google because we see the best returns.
Read full review
Microsoft
Obviously Google is a huge competitor. Typically Google is top of the game for many advertising solutions including search. Microsoft ads has a lower scale and reach compared to Google. However, Microsoft ads audience does not overlap much with Googles, providing incremental reach. Although Microsoft ads lags a bit behind in adapting the new updates that Google comes out with, their customer service is very good and they are likely to go out of their way to adapt their platform to your needs whereas their competitor does not
Read full review
Return on Investment
Google
  • Google Ads is often one of our highest ROI channels, especially when you factor in branded ads.
  • Depending on the stage your business is in, search ads can be really powerful from an ROI perspective, providing an investment with a very high spend cap.
  • If you do not manage the campaigns well though, you can quickly spend a lot of money on nothing. So make sure someone is keeping an eye on your account.
Read full review
Microsoft
  • We've had a very hard time spending our budgets on Bing which has caused us a lot of extra work on our end. We've essentially had to move that money back to Google or other platforms.
  • It does have an easy import from Google so you're not doubling efforts.
  • The CPCs tend to be less expensive than Google - which is always good for business owners.
Read full review
ScreenShots