Here’s something you probably haven’t seen unless you’re a Microsoft employee:

The screenshot above shows a Honda logo icon placed inside a Live Search sponsored search ad. It comes to us from a Search Engine Land reader doing search marketing in the auto industry, who explained how it happened: “I’ve been told by Microsoft reps that I should not be seeing this (it’s not even in pilot yet), but our IP has probably been erroneously targeted as internal.”

The ad shown above is essentially an exact duplicate of the one that currently shows to all users on a search for “honda,” but with the company logo showing in between the ad’s headline and the URL.

If this is something Microsoft is planning to roll out into Live Search, they’ll be joining an already existing trend toward branded and graphical search ads. Earlier this week, we wrote about an expanded Google AdWords favicon test. Last fall, we wrote about thumbnail images showing on AdWords ads in Google Images. And Yahoo recently announced Rich Ads in Search, which places video or images in paid ads.

Related Topics: Microsoft: adCenter

About The Author: Matt McGee is Search Engine Land's Executive News Editor, responsible for overseeing our daily news coverage. His news career includes time spent in TV, radio, and print journalism. His web career continues to include a small number of SEO and social media consulting clients, as well as regular speaking engagements at marketing events around the U.S. He blogs at Small Business Search Marketing and can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee and/or on Google Plus. See more articles by Matt McGee