There’s plenty of online chatter about Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine.   Some writers are impressed by the quality and diversity of results, some have pointed out questionably unoriginal design choices, others are starting to provide advice on how to claim your business in Bing’s local results.

Looks like... a search engine

But one response that caught my eye comes from Good Experience. The crux of their post:

Microsoft’s strategy, to win market share from Google, is not to compete on user experience. No. Microsoft’s strategy is to advertise the heck out of the thing and hope people flock to the site. They are spending – wait, let me try my best “Dr. Evil” voice – one hundred million dollars to order the world to use their search engine.

It’s not that Microsoft hasn’t done a good job with Bing: comparisons show some small advantages going both ways. The problem is, as Good Experience points out, that they’re not providing any significant benefit for users to switch — they’re focused on advertising driving adoption, instead of the product.

In a larger sense it’s a question of focus. Your small business probably doesn’t have to worry about taking on a behemoth like Google — but if you did, you’d be better off focusing on things that Google doesn’t do well already. Stay focused on areas where you can either outsell your competition or innovate in ways that the competition hasn’t, yet.

What’s your focus these days? Saving money? Improving your products or services? Just keeping your head above water? Let us know in the comments below.