What's in a Name? Questioning Cingular's Switch to ATT

What’s in a name?  When is it worth it to change a name?  I was watching TV this evening and saw, for the umpteenth time, a commercial ‘reintroducing’ Cingular as AT&T.  I certainly understand that the AT&T name has more cache, but it’s an old brand that was left for dead when Cingular purchased its wireless business a few years back.  I can’t figure out whether its worth the effort – and money – to re-brand the company.

I believe that naming a company is a strategic exercise.  A great name can go a long way to creating awareness and building a powerful brand – after all, where would Starbucks be if they’d named it Joe’s Gourmet Coffee?  In naming my company “Imagine,” I spent a great deal of time and effort in deciding which name would make sense.

I am completely in favor of spending an extraordinary amount of effort on naming a company.  However, I believe that the name is only one component (and not the most important one at that) in determining how successful a company will be. Rumor has it that the AT&T name scored higher in recall with European consumers and hence was the choice since the company has targeted Europe as its next growth market.  In spite of this, Cingular’s name change to AT&T still seems trite, manufactured and manipulative.  You have to wonder how the company’s stockholders feel about footing the bill for the enormous cost of changing the signage alone.  Why would Cingular trash the equity it has built in its name in favor of resuscitating a dead brand that never built much of a reputation for reliability, service or innovation in the mobile phone market previously?

Wouldn’t it make more sense for Cingular to put its money and energy into creating and delivering a more compelling experience?  (By the way, I think their agreement with Apple is genius.)  I, and many others like me, neither find our cellular phone experience compelling (or even satisfying) nor do we care what the name of the company providing the service is.

Cingular, for all its lip service to consumer research and the glory of the AT&T brand, seems focused on pulling off a cheap marketing trick with a very expensive name change. Whenever a company focuses on an internal move like this one, it demonstrates clearly that it isn’t focusing on creating value.  So customers, beware.