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Bing Travel launched

Microsoft are making another attempt at conquering the search engine arena, this time with Bing.   Although the search results seem generally good (this blog is in the top 10 for a search for ‘luxury travel’ so I could be a little biased!), I am left thinking that they needed to offer something better still to make a significant impression on Google’s dominance.   I don’t personally buy into the ‘decision engine’ nonsense that they talk about (in fact, I find that terminology a little irritating!) and I’m not convinced that a pretty background is what users want. Anyway… now they have unveiled Bing Travel.   You may recall that last year  Microsoft bought Farecast and Bing Travel looks to be a combination of this technology and editorial from MSN Travel.   It’s a little early to give any well-researched feedback at this early but it looks to be a good facility, if a little cluttered and US-centric.   What do you think?

Paul Johnson

Paul Johnson is Editor of A Luxury Travel Blog and has worked in the travel industry for more than 30 years. He is Winner of the Innovations in Travel ‘Best Travel Influencer’ Award from WIRED magazine. In addition to other awards, the blog has also been voted “one of the world’s best travel blogs” and “best for luxury” by The Daily Telegraph.

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7 Comments

  1. Blah. I think its like every other travel aggregator site out there. No one has stepped up to improve upon the Kayak model yet – they have just copied it. On a positive note, at least it covers Westjet!

  2. It’s going to be US centric for now but it is the travel industry, they must realize not to alienate international clientele and Microsoft should initiate a change quickly, they’ve got the money and the power anyway.

  3. It will be interesting to see how Bing does. They seem to have achieved better press than most other recently launched search engines so who knows. I think the industry does need a viable alternative to Google though.

  4. Powered by Orbitz – it has pretty much the same inventory as sites such as TravelBag, HotelClub, Rates2go and the many other sites Orbitz own. Nothing really new here. Also why it is US centric.

  5. my initial test result shows that Bing is as good as Google when displaying relevant search results. Google might be having a tough competitor with Microsofts own search engine.

  6. It looks good, love the ‘show times matrix’ but also agree with the kayak comments.

    US centric, this is problem with the entire US though. The rest of the world doesnt exist!!! Er… look at the transatlantic traffic everey year!!!

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