Set up Bing Places for Business

Bing Places for Business is Microsoft's free tool for getting your business listed in Bing search results and on Bing Maps, and for keeping those details right. It's the Bing version of your Google Business Profile.

Bing checks the details owners send in against what it finds across other search engines, websites and social media. So Bing recommends keeping your business name, address, phone number and website the same everywhere.

1. Go to Bing Places for Business and sign in.
2. Use a Microsoft, Google, Facebook or work account.

Every listing you claim or create belongs to the account you sign in with, so use one you'll keep for the long run, ideally one tied to your business email.

Then pick one of the two ways below.

This is the quickest way if your Google Business Profile is already set up and verified.

1. In your account, select Import from your Google Business Profile.
2. Choose how often Bing should sync with Google: weekly, biweekly or monthly.
3. Sign in to the Google Account that manages your Business Profile.
4. Import the listings Bing finds.

Bing can bring across your business name, address, phone number, hours, photos and other available details. If your profile is already verified on Google, Bing verifies the imported listing automatically.

1. Sign in to Bing Places for Business.
2. Search for your business: choose your country, enter your business name and location, and select Search.
3. If your business is listed and nobody has claimed it, claim it. If someone else already has, you'll need to request access from them. If it isn't listed at all, select Create a new business.
4. Fill in everything you can: name, address, phone number, category, website and social media links, and hours. You can also add up to 100 photos.

Work from customers' homes? Bing still needs your real address to verify you (a PO box won't do), but you can hide it. Select your listing and choose Edit. In Basic details, find the question "Are customers expected to visit your address?" and choose to show your whole address or just your city and zip code.

Verifying protects your listing from changes by anyone else. Bing sends you a PIN (a short code), and you enter it in Bing Places. Depending on your listing, you can get the PIN by:

• Phone. Only offered if the listing already has your business phone number, unedited.
• Text message.
• Email. Make sure you can get into the email address on your account.
• Mail. Bing says postcards typically take 5 to 6 business days to arrive in the U.S., and suggests waiting at least 12 days before contacting support.

Enter the PIN while signed in to the same account that asked for it. Listings imported from a verified Google Business Profile skip this step.

Once your listing is verified, Bing publishes it. Bing calls the time this takes a publish cycle, and it's typically 7 to 12 days in North America. While you wait, the listing may show a Pending Publish status.

• Your PIN doesn't work. Someone else, like an agency, may have started verification from a different account. You have to enter the PIN from that same account. Otherwise, check you typed it correctly, have a new PIN sent, or contact Bing Places support.
• The postcard never arrived. Check with your local post office, then contact support.
• Your listing is marked Duplicate. You can't edit a duplicate. Claim the published listing instead, or ask whoever manages it for access.
• It still isn't live after 12 days. Bing asks you to contact support so they can review it.

With Google and Bing covered, claim your spot on Apple Maps with our guide to Apple Business. And if you haven't already, set up Bing Webmaster Tools for your website.

This guide is free for everyone. It's also one of the step-by-step setup guides included with our SEO and AI-search audit, so every fix in your report comes with instructions you can follow.