I said it myself. I used to say it somewhat often.

When I was reviewing ads that my agency created for me at Pep Boys, eBay’s Half.com, etc…I would say “make the logo bigger.”

I was naive. I was unaware. I was uninformed…and didn’t have the benefit of response results.

Today, smart marketers leave their logo out.

Heresy!

Not quite.

When I speak publicly, I’ll ask the audience how many people subscribe to magazines.

All hands go up.

Then I ask how many people subscribe for the ads.

All hands go down.

All.

I ask the person in the blue shirt in row seven if they can remember an ad from their magazine.
They painfully say no.

Then I ask if they can remember an article from that magazine…and they go into detail. “Sure, it was a review of the Porsche 911 4-wheel drive going all over Germany…”

Today, the INSTANT a consumer knows something is an advertisement, they immediately ignore it.

The logo is what they call in the world of poker…a “tell.”

But it’s not so subtle.

More like a big red honkin’ flag.

Waving, jumping up and down at the very audience you want to reach, saying “I’m an ad, I’m an ad.”

What you want, is someone to first pay attention to your ad. And second, take something away from it (and third hopefully talk about it).

But if you did like I did…”make the logo bigger,” you simply alert consumers even more.

Today, consumers pay attention to CONTENT 6X more than ads.

If your purchased media looks like content, it will get noticed.

If you even put a logo on there, it won’t.

Do yourself a favor…put a website address (perhaps one without your brand name like “DepressionHurts.com”) in your paid media.

Take your logo out…it’s a tell with a foghorn blaster on it.

Mark Hughes is a professional speaker, consultant, and author of the book Buzzmarketing: Get People to Talk About Your Stuff.