Apparently large ads are in demand right now. Just a few days after writing about Google’s giant ads, I am learning that Bing is also adding large advertising options to their ad network. These ads, dubbed “Hero Ads” by Microsoft come up only when searchers type in brand names such as Home Depot or Land Rover. This is very similar to the Google Ads which are also only for name brand searching.
Hero ads are full screen, interactive ‘home pages’ for these brands, however. Currently these ads are being tested with brands including Land Rover, Jaguar, Home Depot, Norwegian Cruise Line, Radio Shack, Hertz and Volkswagen. When searchers type in these terms, they won’t get the normal search engine results page that they are used to. Instead they will be brought to a full screen page with images, site links and many other options. For the Land Rover ads, you can even click to schedule a test drive right from the search page!
At the top left corner, you will find a button to take you to normal, organic search results (something becoming increasingly rare these days, it seems). Bing believes that most people who type in these major brand names are looking specifically for that company, and not some third party website. With these ads, they will be able to deliver exactly what the searcher is looking for. Whether or not this is an accurate belief, we’ll have to wait and see.
At this time these ads are only being displayed to users of Windows 8.1, so if you are looking to experiment with the new format, you might be disappointed. There has been no announcement as to how long this test run will last, or when we might expect to see the ads on other operating systems.
For additional details about these new “Hero Ads” you can see the full announcement from Bing.
