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Shop and Share with Bing was announced earlier this week. Integrating sharing links within product searches is not exactly groundbreaking. The idea that social proof works to drive purchasing behaviour online is not new. A number of different sites such as mypicklist.com (now gone), ThisNext.com and Amazon through their ratings and owned product lists support this. What is interesting is that this is another way in which Search Engines are beginning to act like portals.

The team behind Bing has shown a willingness to be as creative as Google in their approach to search. From launch, Bing has been referred to as a decision engine, and they seem focused on this goal. The Microsoft Fuse Labs Spindex project using Bing certainly matches this aim. It is an inclusive integration of the user’s social network into their search experience. The Search Engine Result Page (SERP) is influenced by the behaviour of members of the user’s social networks. This looks like an extension of what Google is doing with Social Search and in a way is a good demonstration of just how pervasive a social Internet can be.

The Preview of the new Windows Live Messenger also shows real intent to move into this area. Bringing social content together through a stand alone application, one which millions of people will certainly already have installed on their computers at some point, will be interesting.

Between a fragmenting web and social content being used across multiple platforms and tools including search and general content discovery, the online experience of any two people attempting to complete the same task will very rarely match. There are a number of ways to move around this, such as building a branded query space, becoming the portal or controlling the platform or device they use. Of course not adapting is always an option as well.