Caleb Ulku argues that Microsoft/Bing Shopping ads are a highly underutilized channel that can dramatically outperform Google Shopping on ROAS. The core insight is that Bing's user base skews heavily toward desktop users (80-90% desktop vs. ~30% for Google), which leads to higher e-commerce conversion rates, while lower advertiser competition keeps CPCs at roughly half of Google's. He walks through the painful but worthwhile process of setting up a Microsoft Merchant Center product feed, specifically the workaround of using Excel's 'paste special as text' to reformat the tab-delimited feed file before saving it as a plain text file for upload. He reports regularly seeing 10%+ conversion rates at $1-2 CPCs on Bing Shopping.
Microsoft's product advertising platform where e-commerce products appear in Bing search results with photos and prices, offering lower cost-per-click and higher desktop conversion rates compared to Google Shopping.
View concept page →A metric measuring the revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising; the video argues Bing Shopping can multiply this figure compared to Google Shopping.
View concept page →The observation that Bing's user base skews older, wealthier, and predominantly desktop-based (80–90% desktop traffic), making it ideal for e-commerce products targeting that demographic.
View concept page →The principle that e-commerce stores convert significantly better on desktop devices than on mobile, making platforms with higher desktop traffic more valuable for e-com advertisers.
View concept page →Because most marketers ignore Bing in favor of Google, competition is lower and Bing's average cost-per-click is roughly half that of Google's.
View concept page →Microsoft's platform for managing product feeds and stores required to run Bing/Microsoft Shopping ads, analogous to Google's Merchant Center but more complex to set up.
View concept page →Microsoft Merchant Center requires product feeds to be submitted as plain text files (tab-delimited), unlike Google's spreadsheet-based feed, making setup more difficult but reducing advertiser competition.
View concept page →A practical shortcut where the Microsoft product feed example is copied, pasted into Excel using 'Paste Special > Text' to preserve tab-delimited column structure, edited, then saved as a plain text file via Notepad.
View concept page →The primary guest and SEO expert featured in the video, founder of an AI SEO agency that developed the Core 30 local SEO methodology and scaled to 97 plumber clients using AI-driven content and local link-building strategies.
View concept page →Google's product advertising format that displays product images, titles, and prices in search results; used as the baseline comparison for Bing Shopping performance.
View concept page →The strategic principle that platforms ignored by most marketers (like Bing) offer better advertising value due to lower competition, resulting in cheaper clicks and higher returns.
View concept page →Microsoft's tracking tags placed on an e-commerce site to measure ad conversions, required to link a site to the Microsoft Merchant Center and run Shopping campaigns.
View concept page →There are two major advantages to Bing Shopping over Google Shopping: First, the cost per click on Bing is almost half of what Google charges. Second, Bing has a much higher conversion rate because 80-90% of Bing searches happen on desktop devices, and e-commerce stores convert significantly better on desktop than on mobile. In contrast, about 70% of Google searches are on mobile devices, which convert poorly for e-com. Combined, these two factors can result in a return on ad spend (ROAS) that is multiple times higher than what you'd get from Google Shopping alone.
Bing Shopping ads work best for products that appeal to older, whiter demographics who use desktop computers. Bing's user base largely consists of people who bought a Windows computer and haven't changed the default search engine — meaning they tend to be less tech-savvy, older users. If your e-commerce product naturally fits this audience, Bing Shopping is especially valuable.
Approximately 80 to 90 percent of Bing searches are conducted on desktop devices. This is in stark contrast to Google, where only about 30 percent of searches come from desktops — with the remaining roughly 70 percent coming from mobile devices.
The cost per click on Bing is almost half of what it costs on Google. This is largely because many marketers ignore Bing, resulting in less competition and lower bid prices.
You can regularly see conversion rates above 10% on Bing Shopping ads, often with a cost per click in the $1 to $2 range. This is considered very high for shopping ads and, combined with the low cost per click, makes Bing Shopping extremely profitable for the right products.
The first step is to go to the Microsoft Merchant Center and create a store. To do this, you need to claim your property using either Bing Webmaster Tools or Bing's conversion tracking tags. If you already have a Microsoft Ads campaign with conversion tracking set up, you can use those same tags to link to your Microsoft Merchant Center account. If you're new to Bing, you'll need to create a Microsoft Ads account and set up conversion tracking first.
Google Shopping makes product feed creation easy through a web form or a Google Doc spreadsheet with pre-filled column headings. Microsoft Merchant Center, on the other hand, only accepts product feeds as plain text files — not spreadsheets or web forms. This unusual requirement is a major reason many marketers avoid Bing Shopping, but it also means less competition for those willing to figure it out.
Bing does allow you to import a Google product feed, but the result will be full of errors because there isn't a one-to-one field mapping between Google's format and Microsoft's format. The recommended approach is to manually create a product feed specifically formatted for Microsoft Merchant Center rather than relying on the import feature.
The recommended workflow is: 1) Search for a 'Microsoft Merchant Center product feed example' to find a sample feed file. 2) Copy the example content. 3) Open Excel or Google Sheets, and use 'Paste Special' → 'Text' to paste it correctly — this ensures tab-separated values are recognized as separate columns. 4) Fill in your product data across the columns (title, brand, ID, link, price, etc.). 5) Copy the completed data and paste it into Notepad (or any plain text editor). 6) Save and upload the resulting text file to Microsoft Merchant Center.
When you paste the raw example feed text directly into Excel using a normal paste, it appears as a complete mess because Excel doesn't automatically recognize the tab-separated values as separate columns. The solution is to use 'Paste Special' and select 'Text' as the paste format. Excel is then smart enough to interpret the tab breaks as column separators, giving you a properly organized, readable spreadsheet.
Because most marketers ignore Bing Shopping due to its difficult setup process, there are fewer advertisers bidding on keywords. This reduced competition directly lowers the cost per click — to nearly half of what Google charges. So the technical barrier to entry actually works in your favor once you've overcome it, giving you cheaper clicks with less competition.
Transferring your Google product campaigns to Bing Shopping — or running them in parallel — typically increases your overall return on ad spend significantly, often by multiple factors. This is because Bing offers roughly half the cost per click of Google and nearly double the conversion rate due to its desktop-heavy user base. The presenter states that Bing Shopping ROAS is likely to be multiple times higher than Google Shopping ROAS.
If you're completely new to Bing Ads, you should: 1) Go to the Microsoft Ads platform and create a Microsoft Ads account. 2) Set up conversion tracking on your e-commerce site (or your client's site). 3) Use those conversion tracking tags to link your account to the Microsoft Merchant Center. 4) Once the Merchant Center is set up and your store is approved, proceed to create your product feed and shopping campaigns.
Based on the example feed shown in the video, the key fields in a Microsoft Merchant Center product feed include: Title, Brand, ID, Link (product URL), and Price. These are the core columns visible in the example, though a complete feed may require additional attributes depending on the product category.
Yes, according to the presenter, it is absolutely worth the effort. Despite Bing Shopping being notoriously difficult to set up — with Microsoft Merchant Center described as 'absolutely terrible' and 'awful' — the payoff is significant: cost per click at nearly half of Google's rate, conversion rates regularly above 10%, and an overall ROAS that can be multiple times higher than Google Shopping. The difficulty is also a competitive advantage, since most marketers avoid it, leaving less competition for those who push through the setup.
The video states as a known fact that e-commerce stores don't convert as well on mobile devices compared to desktop. While the specific reasons aren't elaborated on in the transcript, this is a widely recognized pattern — desktop users tend to have larger screens for easier browsing, more comfortable checkout experiences, and are often in a more deliberate purchase mindset. Since Bing's traffic is 80-90% desktop, this makes Bing Shopping inherently better suited for e-commerce conversions.