Hoping to recoup some of its loses from its disastrous Cashback shopping promotion, Microsoft is introducing Bing Rebates. This new program, which was leaked to the media just a few weeks ago by several social media news aggregators, will make rebates become available for certain Microsoft Rewards customers — but only if they make a purchase through a participating Bing retailer. Once again, the offer sounds more dazzling than it is — once you read the fine print.
If these rebates are competitive with other search engine shopping platforms, Microsoft may at last have found the answer to its continuing and much superior competition from other Silicon Valley giants like Paypal’s recent acquisition of the rebate-generating Honey, or Google and it’s newly updated Shopping Experience and their use of coupon sites from 3rd parties who are partners with most publishers. Microsoft is still being cagey about just exactly what the incentives are going to be for their new program, but there’s no doubt they are serious about attracting consumers away from other online search & shop platforms and funneling them into Microsoft shopping mania.
The post-holidays are traditionally a time when consumers, burned out with bargain hunting and rebate runaround, are open to new online options — so at least Microsoft’s timing couldn’t be better.