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Over a decade ago, when Karen Sheriff launched a branding campaign for what was then a large U.S. telecommunications firm, Ameritech Corp., she focused on the customer.

As the executive at the helm of corporate marketing and branding, Sheriff oversaw the interviewing of tens of thousands of customers and employees to learn what Ameritech's brand identity could be.

In an article Sheriff wrote, published in 1998 by the New York-based Association of National Advertisers, Inc., she estimated that Ameritech would spend $1 billion on initiatives like revamping its automated voice response system, establishing 24-hour customer service and providing cell phones to service technicians so they could reach customers - all to "deliver the Ameritech brand experience."

"In any competitive market," she wrote, "the strength of a company's brand obviously represents an enormous - and enormously valuable - competitive advantage."

Now, just over 10 years on, Sheriff is the president and CEO of the troubled telecommunications firm, Bell Aliant (TSX:BA.UN).

Just two months into the job, Sheriff announced this week that the company will axe about 500 managerial jobs.

Her senior executive team has already been trimmed from 11 managers to seven.

Analysts say the cuts will likely continue as Sheriff faces one of the toughest assignments of her career so far: turning around a company some say has lacked innovation and convincing customers to buy into its only growth potential - Internet service.

Sheriff, who was born in Chicago but now splits her time between Toronto and Halifax, served for five years in the 1990s at Ameritech before moving over to Bell Canada in 1999 as the chief marketing officer and then as president of small and medium business.

She arrived at Bell Aliant last summer as the chief operating officer.

Between 1984 and 1994, Sheriff worked at United Airlines (NASDAQ.GS:UAUA) in various positions, including being the executive in charge of domestic advertising.

Sheriff should be using her marketing savvy to focus Bell Aliant on nabbing new Internet customers, said Mark Goldberg, a Richmond Hill, Ont.-based telecommunications analyst and consultant who has worked for nearly all the sector's major companies in Canada.

Bell Aliant is stymied by the small scope its services, Goldberg said.

The home phone sector shows little promise as demographic shifts mean more embrace cell phone service - which Bell Aliant does not offer.

The company's only hope is for growth in its Internet business, Goldberg said.

He said while Atlantic Canada has good Internet access, its adoption rates for Internet are lower than in the rest of Canada.

According to a Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission monitoring report from 2007, while 93 per cent of Canadian households have access to broadband services, 65 per cent of these households actually subscribe to the service.

The lowest subscription rate was in Prince Edward Island at 43 per cent of households.

"They need to be the very best Internet service provider," he said, explaining that it's up to Bell Aliant and potential partners - which could include banks with online banking - to lure future customers, especially in rural areas, to the web.

"It's about showing the value of online, then being the best provider."

Goldberg said Sheriff could be good at helping the company build partnerships to navigate rough waters, "because of Karen's background in marketing, understanding the power of the brand."

Goldberg pointing to United Airlines' success at branding its image on a slew of regional carriers it does not own, to create familiarity for customers.

Eamon Hoey, a senior partner of Toronto-based Hoey Associates Management and frequent commentator on the telecommunications industry, said Sheriff should take a page out of NBTel's book and reconnect with the customer, in turn spurring innovation.

"The biggest area to me is to bring innovation to Bell Aliant," Hoey said.

"You've really got to ask yourself: 'What does the customer want?' " Hoey said, adding that he was disappointed when in a press release this week on management cuts, Sheriff was quoted as saying that the "leaner management structure will bring all employees closer to customers," on top of cost reductions.

"Typically what we find in tough times is that companies are turned over to cost cutters." Hoey pointed to the former telecommunications firm NBTel, which merged with Aliant in 1999, as an example of a company that used innovation and dialogue with customers as its mantra for breeding success.

"(NBTel) used to say, 'It's about the customer,'" Hoey said.

As president and CEO, Sheriff's leadership qualities - which she has been building into her marketing roles - will also be important.

She commented on her previous job as chief marketing officer for Bell Canada in an interview for a 2001 story in Marketing Magazine, saying that convincing others of a corporate vision is instrumental to one's success.

"You also need to have a hold over others and be able to persuade others that your vision is the right vision," Sheriff is quoted as saying.

In her role as chairwoman for the board of trustees at the Gardiner Museum in Toronto, Sheriff is known to have a vision for the museum's corporate success that goes beyond idea, according to the museum's executive director, Alexandra Montgomery.

"She's able to traverse the highest concepts, down to the nitty-gritty details."

Sheriff was recognized in 2004, 2005 and 2006 as one of The Women's Executive Network's top 100 Canadians and named to the organization's hall of fame in 2007.

Sheriff declined a request for interview by the Telegraph-Journal.