Why You Should Use Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising Together

In today’s competitive digital landscape, businesses must reach their audiences wherever they spend time online. While most marketers focus heavily on Google Ads, many overlook the untapped potential of Microsoft Advertising. Using both platforms together isn’t just possible, it could be the smartest and most cost-effective way to maximize reach, diversify risk, and boost ROI. In this post, we’ll explore the benefits of combining Google Ads with Microsoft Advertising and how they can complement each other in a unified advertising strategy.

Expanding Your Reach with Two Powerful Platforms

Google Ads is the dominant player in online advertising, with over 90% of global search engine market share. It offers unmatched visibility across Google Search, YouTube, Gmail, and its massive Display Network. Microsoft Advertising (formerly Bing Ads), on the other hand, reaches an audience that many businesses miss. It powers ads across Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo (via syndication), Outlook.com, MSN, and even the Microsoft Edge browser’s news feed. It may only account for 30–40% of U.S. desktop search traffic, but that audience includes high-income professionals, older demographics, and decision-makers the people who are often closer to a purchase. By using both platforms, you’re not choosing one over the other—you’re gaining full coverage across the digital landscape.

Benefits of Running Both Google and Microsoft Ads

1. Wider Audience Reach

Running campaigns on both networks ensures you will reach customers across both Google’s and Microsoft’s search ecosystems. For example, a potential customer may begin a search on Google during lunch and continue it on Bing at work. Using both platforms ensures your business stays visible throughout the journey.

2. Lower Competition & Cost with Microsoft

One of Microsoft Advertising’s biggest advantages is reduced competition. Since fewer advertisers use it, cost-per-click (CPC) is often lower than on Google. That means you can stretch your budget further while targeting high-intent users, especially in industries like finance, law, B2B services, and healthcare.

3. Different Demographics and User Behavior

While Google Ads reaches a more general and diverse audience, Microsoft Advertising often performs better with a more professional, older user base. These users may be browsing on corporate devices, using Microsoft Edge or Windows-integrated services like MSN and Outlook. This difference in demographics provides an opportunity to tailor messaging by platform, reaching different types of customers with content that speaks directly to their needs.

4. Redundancy and Platform Resilience

Marketing strategies that rely too heavily on a single platform are vulnerable to policy changes, account suspensions, or cost spikes. By using both Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising, you diversify your risk and ensure your lead pipeline remains strong, even if one platform experiences issues.

How to Use Them Together

Import and Sync Campaigns

Microsoft Advertising makes it easy to import your Google Ads campaigns directly into its platform. The built-in Google Import Tool allows you to copy over campaigns, ad groups, keywords, extensions, and even budgets. You can also set the import to run on a schedule, so changes in your Google Ads account are automatically reflected in Microsoft. This saves time and ensures a consistent advertising presence across both networks.

Track Results Across Platforms

To measure success across Google and Microsoft, use tools like:

·        Google Analytics for unified tracking

·        Microsoft Clarity for behavior analytics

·        Microsoft UET (Universal Event Tracking) for conversion tracking

·        Google Tag Manager to manage both sets of tracking scripts efficiently

These tools help you understand how users interact with your ads, which campaigns convert best, and how to optimize performance on each platform.

Tailor Creative and Bidding Strategy

While duplicating campaigns is a good starting point, don’t stop there. Each platform has unique strengths and audiences. Test different headlines, CTAs, or landing pages on Microsoft to see what resonates with that audience. Adjust your bidding strategy based on platform-specific performance data.

Final Thoughts

Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising each bring distinct advantages to your digital marketing strategy. Google offers volume and visibility; Microsoft offers cost efficiency and access to a high-value audience.

·        Using both together allows you to:

·        Expand your reach

·        Lower your cost per acquisition (CPA)

·        Diversify your audience

·        Reduce platform risk

When planning your ad budget, it's worth noting that Microsoft Advertising typically offers a lower cost-per-click (CPC) compared to Google Ads, often by 20% to 35%. That means if you're spending $1,500 per month on Google Ads, you could achieve comparable reach and results on Microsoft Advertising for around $975 to $1,200. This makes Microsoft a highly cost-effective platform, especially for businesses in competitive industries like legal, financial services, or B2B. Many advertisers start by allocating 30–50% of their Google Ads budget to Microsoft to test performance, then scale based on return on investment.

If you're already using Google Ads, adding Microsoft Advertising is a logical next step. And if you’re looking to scale up your results in 2025, this dual-platform strategy is worth considering.