SEO tips and tricks for Bing

There are other changes optimisers and webmasters should keep in mind.

Bing also now shows results with three separate levels of confidence. The first is the standard result, which is what most sites will see on most SERPs. The next is called "best match", which is when Bing has a very high level of confidence in the top ranked result, and therefore offers extra data from the site, such as extra links to important information on the site or contact details.

The third result type is "best match" but with no other results on the page. When Bing is confident it has found exactly what a searcher wants, it hides other results and shows just the top one. While the top results are always chosen via the algorithm, the Bing team chooses on a case-by-case basis, which will become "best match" results, based on how many people are looking for the term. There's no way you can ask for your site to become a "best match", but if it does end up as one, webmasters can update the information displayed on the SERP, meaning traffic can be directed to the best place.

Another new feature, which may affect SEO is instant answers. They aren't new to Microsoft's search tools, but have been upgraded for Bing. Essentially, this type of result brings back an answer, rather than just a link to a page. Searching for weather in London will bring back the forecast, for example.

Another addition to Bing is data extraction from Flash and Silverlight. Bing can read what the image or animation-based pages say, pulling the pertinent data out so it can be indexed in the Bing engine.

Bing research has shown that a fifth of empty page descriptions in the index are from Flash, so this should help those sites be more easily found.