20 New Features of Bing - Microsoft's New Search Engine

Bing – Microsoft’s new search engine will launch on June 3, 2009. The engine will replace Live Search as the default Microsoft search engine. Live Search has struggled to maintain search share among the major search engines. Bing is Microsoft’s answer for a need to rebrand Live Search and to add new competitive features. I’m really looking forward to seeing if this engine can hold up against Google and Yahoo.

Here are 20 new features of Bing compiled from the Bing Product Guide:

Autosuggest - Search suggestions as user types query

Quick view preview feature – Displays preview of page when mouse pointer hovers over result.

Best Match – Bing determines what the best match is for your search query and features it at the top. The rest of the results are hidden so the focus is on the best match. Bing does this when it is very confident about what you are looking for. For example, the search for “UPS” features UPS.com and even has a box to enter a tracking code.

Instant Answers - One-click access to the information listed in the search results. For example, you can enter a flight number and Bing will return the estimated arrival time. You can also type in “traffic” and see what the traffic is like based your geographic location.

Deep Links - Deep Links enable users to see inside the site without having to click into it and learn a new site structure.

Bing Maps - These maps for Enterprise are actually Virtual Earth, Microsoft’s mapping platform

Bing Travel Rate Key - comparison of the Hotel’s the location, price and amenities will be represented in color coded manner

XRank – See what’s popular in the world. XRank provides instant information about the most popular web searches by combining data of raw web searches and Bing’s ranking formula.

Categorized Search – Helps users organize their search by increasing the authority and diversity of results. Bing can group results by category. For instance, a city term may include weather, airport, restaurant, and hotel groups. Celebrity web groups may include pictures, clips, biography and music.

Quick Tabs – Offers easy access to web groups displayed as a panel of the left. Clicking on one will result in a refined query.

Related Searches – Displays related search queries.

Session History – Provides access to previous search queries in the last 48 hours. Users can also save search queries in a folder on their local computer for future use.

Enhanced Video Experience – Users will have a more comprehensive way to search for video. For instance, a user can search for full-length episodes across multiple sites like YouTube and Hulu.

Bing Shopping – Users can search for products and sort them by price, brand, or rating. You can also search for products that provide cashback.

Bing Local – Bing Local provides the user with tools to help make informed decisions on user reviews, menus, hours of operation, and traffic reports. A scorecard rates local businesses on certain criteria based on past customers.

Bing Travel – Offers insight into ticket prices by using Bing Search Farecast and historical data to predict the rise and fall of ticket prices, comparing them against over 100 travel sites. Bing will also alert you to special deals broken out into criteria like weekend trips, record low prices, or flights to family destinations. You can also search for detailed flight information broken down by airport, time of day, or duration. Finally, searchers can search for hotel information such as rates in a detailed manner like they can for flights.

Bing Health - Bing Health provides the searcher with access to medical information from trusted medical resources, including the Mayo Clinic, the American Cancer Society and MedlinePlus. The user will also have easy access to information on symptoms, diagnosis and medical procedures, as well as issues related to drugs and substances, personal health and alternative medicine.

Bing Mobile – Is available in two versions. One for online access via the browser and the other as a downloadable application. Both versions excel with local searches and mapping.

Bing Toolbars – An easily customized toolbar that integrates with a user’s browser. Can alert the user to any new cashback deals or offers when the come available.

Improved Visual Presentation – Bing has a more seamless visual presentation than live search. It is much less cluttered.

What are you first impressions of Bing? I’m really interested to see if people are using it more. Are there certain features that interest you more than others?