In 2005, based on the information from this article in AdAge (from the source of Brand Keys brought to you by some other sponsor and now a major motion picture in Technicolor), Cingular was tied in first for brand loyalty and engagement with Verizon.

As of September 2007? Fourth place.

In January, I wrote a post about how disgusted I was at watching AT&T dump the MUCH stronger Jax persona to go with the old/new world logo and brand assignments.

Some of the thoughts that keep a marketing executive awake at night are return on investment and brand loyalty. While AT&T is still (very slightly) winning the wireless customer war, they’re not exactly the most well-respected brand. The one thing I can point to that will have the most positive residual effect is that they were chosen by Apple to sell their product. That doesn’t mean, however, that they a) support it very well, or b) have as reliable a network as they claim. They don’t. On both fronts. I’ve been a subscriber before and left them for greener pastures (wrapped in a horrible matrix of bad customer service but better coverage with VZ), and reluctantly returned due to my acquisition of the iPhone.

AT&T should have stayed as Cingular. The AT&T that the Boomers and the Gen X-ers know is one of monolithic legend, tearing through any Baby Bell it can find in an effort to dominate world communications (poorly, I might add).

Will AT&T overcome this horrid representation? Will they be able to do, as is suggested, create an AT&T 3.0? Will it matter?

How Apple Can Help

If, as expected, Apple released the GPS version along with a new SDK, it won’t matter what AT&T does since it’ll be about the second wind of the device, not the service. True, having true signal reliability will go a long way to help the company’s perceived brand promise, but it won’t matter if they not only go with the natural progression of the iPhone, but embrace other open-source devices as well.

Apple is in the unique and powerful position to bend AT&T as if they’re playfully and lazily waving their magic money wand back and forth to a hypnotized AT&T line of executives.

This isn’t such a bad thing, so long as Apple keeps their promise of opening up their device a little (and, really, they’ll only open it a little).

Steve strikes again.