Last week Microsoft launched its new search decision engine, Bing.

Bing comes equipped with some very cool features, and offers citizens of the intrawebs a unique, impressive web experience.

Although it’ll be quite a while before we can see the lasting impact of this effort from Microsoft, there are several features that do bode well for the future.

First and foremost, Bing is a quality product, and Microsoft has the resources and energy to maintain and refine it.

Second, Bing’s advertising has taken a decidedly positive tone, focusing on the product’s features rather than calling out any direct competitors by name.

The Bing ads are tasked with communicating a potentially difficult-to-grasp message: The primary obstacle Microsoft faces, notes Advertising Age, is that 65% of people are satisfied with their current search engine. Thus, Microsoft must teach their audience that search engines can do and offer more than users are used to.

To illustrate this point, the ads touch on problems faced by everyone who has ever searched for a general (or even not so general) subject.

The ads explore dietary needs for pregnant women, finding the right bar for a birthday party, finding the best place to eat breakfast, booking plane tickets to Hawaii, and just about everything else.

Microsoft has made some smart moves with their campaign, like targeting areas of television frequented by their target audience, and by hosting what they called the “Bing-a-thon“-a live, one-hour infomercial-esque presentation celebrating the launch of the engine and its many features. The Bing-a-thon was hosted by Jason Sudeikis (from SNL) and Olivia Munn (from the dreams of nerds everywhere). The one hour show ended up drawing more viewers in one hour than the previous Dave Matthews concert did over the course of three hours.

How has the competition responded to this combination of smart product and smart marketing? The New York Post reports,

[Google] co-founder Sergey Brin is so rattled by the launch of Microsoft’s rival search engine that he has assembled a team of top engineers to work on urgent upgrades to his Web service, The Post has learned.

Brin, according to sources inside the tech behemoth, is himself leading the team of search-engine specialists.

Bing certainly faces an uphill battle from competitors (Google and Yahoo! currently comprise 80% of the search market), and also defining itself as the most famous Bing (e.g., Bing Crosby, Bing Cherries, Chandler Bing, the Bing Bong Brothers, etc.)-but it sure has started strong.

tags: advertising, marketing