Microsoft Copilot is embedded in Windows 11, Edge, Word, Excel, Outlook, Teams and SharePoint. The work version is now called Microsoft Copilot (formerly Microsoft 365 Copilot), and the free work chat is Microsoft Copilot Chat. For B2B brands this is strategically significant: Copilot reaches an enterprise audience that is often under-represented in consumer LLMs like ChatGPT, but that makes purchase decisions.
Where does Microsoft Copilot get its answers from?
Microsoft Copilot gets web knowledge from the Bing search service and company knowledge from Microsoft Graph. According to Microsoft documentation, when web search is on, Copilot turns the prompt into a search query of a few words, sends it to Bing without user or tenant identifiers and composes the answer from the results. The full prompt and entire files are not sent to Bing, and admins can switch web search off. Since February 10, 2026, the AI Performance report in Bing Webmaster Tools (public preview) shows how often a site is cited in Microsoft Copilot, in Bing's AI-generated summaries and in select partner integrations, including cited URLs and grounding queries. For models, Microsoft uses its own MAI models, partner models and open-source models. For brands, this means: if you are missing from the Bing index, you cannot appear as a source in Copilot web answers, and if you ignore the AI Performance report, you give up citation measurement straight from the vendor.
Copilot generates answers across two layers. (1) Web-based: the Bing search service as retrieval source, complemented by the reasoning of the language models in use. In our assessment this resembles ChatGPT Search mechanics, not least because the OpenAI Help Center also names Bing as a search partner. Microsoft-specific ranking signals are not documented. (2) Graph-based (enterprise): Microsoft Graph delivers tenant-internal content — SharePoint documents, Teams chats, Outlook calendars. This layer sits on the customer side and is not directly addressable from external SEO.
Copilot's web search runs through the Bing search service, per Microsoft
open protocol for instant URL notification to Bing and other search engines
citation report in Bing Webmaster Tools since February 2026 (public preview)
The five levers for Copilot visibility
1. Verify Bing indexation. Bing Webmaster Tools set up, XML sitemap submitted, URL-inspection gaps closed, AI Performance report reviewed regularly. In our audits of DACH mid-market companies, 20-40 percent of Google-indexed URLs were often missing from Bing (own observation, evidence level C, see benchmarks).
2. Activate IndexNow. IndexNow is an open protocol that instantly reports new, changed and deleted URLs to participating search engines (Microsoft Bing, Naver, Seznam.cz, Yandex, Yep). Implementation: generate an API key, activate a CMS or Cloudflare plugin. In the Bing Webmaster Blog, Microsoft describes IndexNow as a way to keep content fresh across search and AI answers; it does not commit to a fixed indexation time.
3. Schema.org graph. Bing processes common Schema.org types. In our experience, a schema implementation with an @id graph helps to unambiguously connect brand, author and product; Microsoft does not document an official Copilot weighting (evidence level D).
4. Passage engineering. Analogous to ChatGPT — 200-400 token chunks with a claim-evidence structure. Copilot often shows answers in compact contexts (Office side panels, Edge answer cards) where readability inside that reduced context matters.
5. Entity consolidation for the Microsoft context. Maintained LinkedIn profile (LinkedIn belongs to Microsoft; whether Copilot uses LinkedIn data as an entity source is not documented by Microsoft, hypothesis), Crunchbase for company profiles, Wikidata for general entities.
| Copilot surface | Primary context | Retrieval source | Dominant SEO lever |
|---|---|---|---|
| Web app (copilot.microsoft.com) | Standalone chat | Bing search service + models from Microsoft and partners | Bing indexation + schema graph |
| Edge browser sidebar | Context-sensitive to the active page | Bing + current URL | Clear passage structure on your own pages |
| Windows 11 | OS-integrated assistant | Bing index | Local entity signals (LocalBusiness) |
| Microsoft Copilot in Word/Excel (formerly M365 Copilot) | Office documents | Microsoft Graph + Bing (web toggle) | Web presence for web-grounded queries |
| Teams Copilot | Meetings & chat | Microsoft Graph internal | Not externally addressable |
Is your Bing coverage complete?
A 30-minute live audit of your Bing indexation against Google indexation (gap rate), IndexNow status and schema parity for Copilot integration.
Copilot at work: the enterprise edge
The work version (Microsoft Copilot, formerly Microsoft 365 Copilot) is particularly relevant for CMOs and sales teams: employees at target accounts ask Copilot for solutions inside their own context, such as "which CRM tools fit our use case?". According to Microsoft, Copilot can then combine information from company data with a "From the web" section based on Bing results, unless web search has been disabled by admin policy. Brands cleanly present at the web level through Bing have a chance to be included in these answers.
Bottom line: Bing optimization is mandatory, not a niche play
Bing was, for a long time, the "other" search engine with marginal market share. With Copilot integration across the Microsoft stack its strategic weight has grown clearly: every enterprise brand should maintain Bing visibility at the same level as Google visibility. The effort is moderate (IndexNow plus Webmaster Tools plus schema parity), the upside in B2B substantial.
Sources
- Microsoft Learn: Data, privacy, and security for web search in Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft Copilot Chat (August 18, 2026)
- Bing Webmaster Blog: Introducing AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools Public Preview (February 10, 2026)
- IndexNow: IndexNow protocol (accessed September 23, 2026)
- Microsoft AI: Two in-house models in support of our mission (August 28, 2025)
- OpenAI Help Center: ChatGPT search for Enterprise and Edu (accessed September 23, 2026)