AT&T Wants To “Rethink Possible”

• Rob Jackson
• 15 years ago

AT&T is ditching their company image and moving onto another philosophy entirely. Their recent “coverage” and “3G” spat with Verizon might get buried underneath a new slogan – “Rethink Possible” – and a new logo. Clearly their marketing team and engineering/product strategy team aren’t on the same page, because the latter seem to be asking, “Can we rethink a possible way to force AT&T Android users to download only the apps we want them to, and force them to keep our AT&T apps?”

Nevertheless, I appreciate the company’s move AWAY from the negativity:

“It’s not going to be the old model that there’s brand work, and then there’s consumer work or enterprise work; it’s all ‘Rethink Possible,'” said Senior VP-Brand Marketing and Advertising Esther Lee. “All of our communications across all of these channels is ‘Rethink Possible’ and this integration of design.”

This isn’t some little idea they want to test out, but rather an “an integrated campaign that includes print, outdoor, digital and non-advertising marketing,” that begins with a TV spot on today’s broadcast of the Master’s Golf Tournament.

While AT&T will continue to use “branding” as a way of adding invisible value, I’m pretty sure Verizon will continue their assault on under-performing competitors. Their most recent advertisements calling out Comcast for their new brand “Xfinity”? Hilarious and true if you ask me.

I mainly dislike negative ads that are misleading or intentionally and unnecessarily harsh – but in the above Xfinity case – I think its rather funny not to mention accurate.

About 6 months ago, HTC changed their slogan from HTC Innovation to “Quietly Brilliant“, and this AT&T rebranding feels like a similar move. Ironically, HTC was sued by Apple a few months later for failure to innovate, claiming they infringed on 20 patents (HTC: Oh yeah?). While that battle continues, HTC floods television sets in America with a far-reaching ad campaign to brand the manufacturer itself. I’d expect a similar approach from AT&T.

I’m thinking that AT&T definitely needs to “rethink possible” but in a different sense: with a new iPhone OS, new iPhone hardware, iPad and now multiple Androids – will their network possibly be able to handle all that data flying through the air? They better pray its possible, or get crackin’ on some serious infrastructure updates.

[Via BusinessInsider]