Microsoft Bing Search Engine Launches Early

Microsoft launched its new search engine, Bing, a few days earlier than expected. The search engine is designed to give users a more granular experience, allowing them to not only hunt for general information, but also conduct specialized searches for travel and shopping. Microsoft hopes that Bing will allow it to claim more market share in the competitive search-engine arena, which is dominated by Google. More from eWeek.

Twitter search engine Topsy launches with $15M

Topsy.com, launched last week, is a brand new search engine focused exclusively on Twitter content. Like Google, it presents its results based on popularity metrics, namely the popularity or influence of the tweeter in question — a factor determined by how many followers the user has and how many time his or her messages have been re-tweeted. More from Venture Beat.

Apparently the way Topsy works, is that a search is queued and results are brought forth, mainly to links posted in Twitter by users. A search on “Outer Banks”, for example, yields results from the Twitter accounts of various regional news stations and newspapers, plus a few OBX real estate companies. It doesn’t appear to be as thorough as Google as far as relevant information is concerned, but in terms of popularity via Twitter this is where people are going.

How can Topsy work to the advantage of somebody in SEO? As you search Topsy, the results will pull up a list of Twitter users who have recently “tweeted” most often on the topic. This will give you a good idea on which Twitter users may be followed (or may be inclined to follow you back). Users of Topsy will be more inclined to find your information online the more you “tweet” using relevant key phrases.