Microsoft Ads: The Cheaper Clicks Your Penrith Competitors Are Ignoring

Ask most Penrith business owners where they advertise online and you’ll hear the same answer: Google. Ask their agency why they don’t run Microsoft Ads as well, and the answer is usually a shrug. “Nobody uses Bing.”

That’s not quite true. And the real reason many agencies skip it has less to do with results and more to do with workload.

The awkward truth about why agencies skip it

Running a second ad platform means a second account to build, a second set of search terms to review, a second conversion setup to check and a second report to write. For an agency on a fixed monthly retainer, that’s extra hours for the same fee.

So it quietly drops off the list. Not because it doesn’t work, but because it isn’t convenient.

We think that’s the wrong way round. If a channel can bring you good leads at a lower cost, it deserves a look. Even if it’s smaller.

Who’s actually searching on Microsoft

Microsoft’s search ads don’t just show on Bing.com. They also appear across the Microsoft Search Network, which includes:

• Bing, the default search engine in Microsoft Edge on most Windows computers
• Copilot, Microsoft’s AI assistant, which can show ads alongside its answers
• Partner sites that use Bing’s results, such as Yahoo, DuckDuckGo and Ecosia

Think about where that puts your ads. Every office PC that nobody bothered to change the default browser on. Every work laptop. Every older customer who simply searches from whatever their computer opened with.

Microsoft’s audience is smaller than Google’s, no question. But it tends to skew towards people searching at work and people who are a little older and often have more to spend. For a lot of local businesses, from accountants and builders to aged-care services and B2B suppliers along the M4 corridor, those are exactly the customers they want.

Why the clicks are often cheaper

Google Ads is an auction. The more businesses bidding on “plumber Penrith” or “conveyancer Penrith”, the more each click costs.

On Microsoft Ads, far fewer advertisers are bidding, because, as above, many agencies don’t bother. Less competition usually means lower costs per click for the same search intent. Someone typing “emergency electrician St Marys” into Bing has exactly the same problem as someone typing it into Google. You just pay less to get in front of them.

It won’t be true for every keyword, and volumes are lower. But the cost per lead is often worth testing.

It’s a top-up, not a replacement

This isn’t a “ditch Google” post. Google is still where most searches happen, and it should be the core of your search advertising.

Microsoft Ads works best as a complement:

1. Get Google right first. Proper conversion tracking, tight keywords, negative keywords and ads that convert.
2. Import what’s working. Microsoft Ads can import your Google Ads campaigns directly, so you’re not starting from scratch.
3. Then tune it. Bing’s audience behaves differently, so bids, ad schedules and locations need their own adjustments. Office-hours searching, for example, often matters more.
4. Keep an eye on it. Imported campaigns still need their own search term reviews and negatives. “Set and forget” is how wasted spend creeps in on any platform.

When it’s not worth it

Being honest about this matters more than selling another channel:

• If your Google Ads aren’t converting yet, adding Microsoft Ads just spreads a broken setup across two platforms. Fix Google first.
• If your budget is very small, splitting it can leave both platforms too thin to learn or perform.
• If your customers are mostly young and mobile-first, the Microsoft audience may be too small to bother with.

For most established local businesses with a working Google account, though, it’s worth a test.

What it could look like for a Penrith business

Imagine a small accounting practice in Penrith already getting steady enquiries from Google Ads. Its customers are business owners, often searching from an office computer during work hours.

Importing the best Google campaigns into Microsoft Ads, then adjusting for business hours and the local area, could add a handful of extra enquiries each month, often at a lower cost per lead than Google. It won’t double the business. But a few more good clients a month, for a modest extra spend, adds up over a year.

Ask your agency this one question

If you’re working with an agency, ask them: “Do you run our campaigns on Microsoft Ads too? And if not, why not?”

“We tested it and it didn’t work for your business” is a great answer. “Nobody uses Bing” is not.

If you’d like a straight answer on whether Microsoft Ads makes sense for your business, book a free account review. We’ll look at your Google Ads first, then tell you honestly whether Microsoft Ads is worth adding.