Verizon charging 4G prices but selling a lot of 3G phones

Verizon Wireless has no plans to lower prices on its smartphone data plans. In fact, Verizon plans to milk as much revenue from its 3G and LTE networks as possible, saying on its fourth quarter financial results call it would establish itself as the “premium” carrier in the data market, charging its customers for quality.

That’s a bold statement considering Verizon suffered a string of LTE outages in December, challenging the credibility of its claim to be the nation’s “most reliable network.” But in general, playing up service quality has always worked for Verizon. It tends to be the highest-priced carrier of the big four, while its consumer perception ratings remain high. I’m just not sure it can maintain such a staunch stance for very long given the realities of the hyper-competitive smartphone market. A premium strategy might work if Verizon customers were all on 4G, but the majority of customers are still gravitating toward its 3G CDMA network. If Verizon’s data customers were only the upper echelon of smartphones users, they would all be flocking to the 4G network, but they’re not exactly coming in droves. Verizon sold 2.3 million LTE smartphones, tablets and mobile hotspots in the quarter, which seems like a lot, but not when you compare it the 7.7 million total smartphones it sold over the holidays.