Why Bing has become the pillar of SEO in the AI era

At a time when generative AIs like ChatGPT, Copilot, or Perplexity shape how we search for and consume information, ranking on Bing has become an essential strategic lever. Far beyond its market share, Bing now powers many AI engines. Not being well indexed there risks disappearing from the results generated by these intelligent assistants.

Bing: the invisible core of AI engines

Since 2024, Bing is no longer just Microsoft's search engine. It has become the backbone of many AI assistants. OpenAI confirmed that ChatGPT Search relies heavily on Bing's index. Tests have shown that if a page is not indexed on Bing, it does not appear in ChatGPT's results, even if it is well represented on Google.

Moreover, tools like Perplexity, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo and Ecosia also use Bing's index to provide answers. You get the point: being absent from Bing means being invisible to a multitude of AI tools!

IndexNow: the secret weapon for fast indexing

Traditionally, search engines discover new pages via crawling or sitemaps. However, these methods can be slow. With IndexNow, developed by Microsoft and Yandex, you can notify Bing directly of new pages or updates.

Expert Olivier Duffez also demonstrated that by using IndexNow, a new page can be indexed on Bing in as little as 8 minutes, a new page can be indexed on Bing and appear on ChatGPT and Perplexity a few hours later, without those AIs even having crawled the page. One more reason to be proactive about indexing your pages!

To learn more about this topic, watch Olivier's explanations in the video below:

As a reminder, IndexNow Insights allows you to analyze pages submitted via IndexNow. The tab is accessible on Bing Webmaster Tools!

GEO: the new SEO for AI engines

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), and its variant GEO Localemerges as a new SEO discipline to integrate into your practice. This means you must now optimize your content not only for traditional search engines but also for generative AIs.

GEO best practices:

• Use structured markup (schema.org) : they help AIs understand content and make effective use of it.
• Favor clear and precise titles and meta tags : Bing favors exact-match keywords in these elements.
• Adopt semantic writing : AI systems better understand well-structured, information-rich content.
• Ensure fast indexing via IndexNow or the Submission API : so that content is quickly available to AI systems.

By adopting these different practices, you increase your chances of appearing in AI-generated answers, thereby boosting your visibility.

Bing SEO: specifics to master

Optimizing for Bing requires an approach slightly different from the one used for Google. Here are some key points to remember:

• Exact-match keywords : Bing places particular importance on exact-match keywords in titles and meta tags.
• Social signals : shares and interactions on social networks can influence rankings on Bing.
• Quality backlinks : inbound links from recognized sites are valued.
• Multimedia content : Bing handles multimedia content, like images and videos, better than Google.

By adapting your SEO strategy to these specificities, you improve your ranking on Bing and, by extension, your visibility on the AI engines that rely on its index.

Bing indexing: a new strategic priority for your SEO

With the rise of generative AIs, being well ranked on Bing is no longer just an option, but rather a necessity. By adopting tools like IndexNow and adapting your SEO strategy to Bing's specifics, you ensure an optimal presence on AI engines. Failing to do so risks missing out on a growing audience that uses these tools to search for information!

The article “Why Bing has become the pillar of SEO in the AI era” was published on the site Abondance.