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What effect, if any, do coins with over-hyped descriptions, have on you?

38 posts in this topic

You see a coin listed for sale.

 

And relative to the images and/or common sense and/or your knowledge, the description ("rainbow", "PQ", "amazing", "finest" - whatever) appears to be hyped, considerably.

 

What effect, if any, does it have on your level of interest and if applicable, your offer or bid?

 

Thanks.

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When a coin is overhyped or comes with a story, there is usually a very good reason. I am much more critical of the coin and price, and I look for what I may have missed (i.e. why the seller feels the need to overhype the listing). Quality coins with good photographs speak for and sell themselves. When I see a seller repeatedly overhype a coin or abuse terms like "rainbow toning" (like Teletrade did), I find it annoying and am less inclined to view the seller's future listings.

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"Hyping" diminishes my level of trust in the seller; more exaggeration results in less confidence the seller knows what he/she is doing. Direct, honest descriptions, when combined with consistent authentication and grading, and good photos should produce the highest customer satisfaction.

 

(Yep...I know... that's about as attainable as objective grading.)

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I have two basic responses:

 

1. I examine the coin for myself, disregarding the poetry, and buy the coin or not based on whether I like it at the price or not.

 

2. I sometimes get a good laugh, or a chuckle, and then move on to better options.

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I can understand a little puffery; but if it's over-hyped that will raise some red flags, and force me to identify the qualities described. If not there; I certainly pass.

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None.

 

Coins have been over hyped since the 1st Dealer figured out that if s/he built up the coin with either mintages, possible mintages, key coin, special finish, speculation of the price of silver and whether or not the series ended/started!

 

If people get the chance, they should acquire some old Coin magazines and read them.

 

They'll see a lot of the hype that occurs today is exactly the same hype that occurred back when the mag was published.

 

I've read stories of the why's wherefore's that the IKE Dollar and SBA Dollar coins had HUGE investment potential for various reasons.

 

As for me, I don't buy because of the hype.

 

I'll buy so that I "can" hype and maybe real in a buyer.

 

The general coin industry amounts to being prepared to acquire that which is currently popular (and/or already popular) at Face Value and then selling the coins at a substantial markup.

 

OR

 

Buying coins in massive unsearched lots or "Intentionally" unsearched lots (I'm too busy to go thru them right now but I'll give you 10x Face Value for whatever you have) YES, dealers do this.

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I would have bid a lot more on the 1822 Half Eagle if not for that whole book about how special and rare it was.

 

If I can examine the coin in hand I pay no attention to the description after I've seen it. If it mentions some attribute in particular, I will pay more attention to that attribute during my examination.

 

If I can't see the coin in person, then I probably weigh the hype in proportion to the amount I trust the seller (which can go negative). So don't worry Mark - Heritage can keep up the superlatives.

 

 

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You see a coin listed for sale.

 

And relative to the images and/or common sense and/or your knowledge, the description ("rainbow", "PQ", "amazing", "finest" - whatever) appears to be hyped, considerably.

 

What effect, if any, does it have on your level of interest and if applicable, your offer or bid?

 

Thanks.

I run almost every time.
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Some buyers like to be pitched to. If there were philosophical schools of selling, some are the zero bs no hype, business-like approach where "the educated consumer is the best customer". But there is a big part of the populace that likes hype, big promises, offer the sky at bargain basement prices "while supplies last". And that goes double in the political realm. PT Barnum offered huge hype to the rubes who liked the sensationalism. Most people can't afford significant losses.

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Since I have not bid on coins for a few years, I'm dependent upon expert dealer descriptions and have made a few high end purchases this year. Usually when I request a high end coin from this particular dealer described as exceptional for date and grade it is just that. If I don't like it I only pay return shipping costs. So for me accurate descriptions are a valuable tool.

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I don't really look too hard into hype. I use my best judgement and knowledge, (or someones knowledge thats better than mine), to make decisions when I buy coins. Most every seller uses hype in one way or another, visually or vocally.

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I don't care much about what the seller has to say in a situation like this. I may still want the coin if I know for sure what it really is. The seller may have something really cool but know nothing about coins or he may be looking for a sucker.

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When a coin is overhyped or comes with a story, there is usually a very good reason. I am much more critical of the coin and price, and I look for what I may have missed (i.e. why the seller feels the need to overhype the listing). Quality coins with good photographs speak for and sell themselves. When I see a seller repeatedly overhype a coin or abuse terms like "rainbow toning" (like Teletrade did), I find it annoying and am less inclined to view the seller's future listings.

 

When I see hyped listings, I laugh and ignore. However, there is a difference between someone hyping a coin and someone trying to accurately describe a coin. "Rainbow toning" is a descriptive phrase and a basic keyword that may be helpful to someone surfing through line items or doing a web search. "Amazing, monster, knock-your-socks-off outstanding maga-toner" or some variation thereof, is hype and fluff.

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If anything it is a negative. If I'm at a show and some blowhard dealer is saying these things I generally end up not trusting him/her (almost always him).

 

In catalogs or eBay I ignore most of that. I'll know once I see a coin whether I'll think it is special. I don't need anyone to tell me that.

 

jom

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I do the same- laugh and ignore. There is an eBay seller that has multiple sights that he sells raw coins- mainly Morgans. On the cardboard 2x2 every coin has PQ MS+++++- like that is supposed to mean MS65?. The pictures are not that good and from what can be seen they look cleaned. Either they are cleaned or the lousy pictures make them look cleaned. Plus they are over priced as if they were high quality graded coins. Needless to say I go through his lots just for fun- to see how many have bids. Very few if any have any bids. To me he is the perfect example of an eBay shyster. I know to stay away but I wonder if newbies may fall for his over-hyping.

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Honestly, it means I am more likely to walk away from the coin after a very quick glance at it.

 

If it is hyped AND looks good, I'll ignore the hype and keep looking. If it over-hypes AND doesn't jump out, in a GREAT way, then I move on past it very quickly.

 

Reason?

Usually have found these types of sellers to be unreasonable. The coins over-priced. Little room to budge on the coin (see aforementioned "over=priced"). Coin, upon closer inspection, has issues or is just common, or barely above.

 

Certain sellers (auction houses included) that over-hype have me ignoring a lot of their coins.....unless I am specifically looking for something.

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Do you mean something along the lines of...

 

"Mother Nature's Baby is what we call this monster. The colors are out of this world! Electric and totally original shades of deep pearl green/royal blue/fiery violet/amber swirl all over the obverse. Picasso or the boldest Peacock in heat can't compare to the magical colors. The colors are so memorable too. We rank the colors an unheard of 100-yes 100 on our 1-10 scale (10 is the best). "

 

In this particular case, the effect it has on me is it makes me wonder how much the writer knows about peacocks in heat.

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And given the name given to the coin, I wonder if it's safe to assume that the peacock in heat is the father of mother nature's baby? Or maybe Picasso has a say in the matter. Might be a good episode of Jerry Springer.

 

Jerry: Pablo....you are NOT the father!

 

Crowd: OOOOOOOH KNOW SHE DINT JERRY!

 

Jerry: Peacock....you are NOT the father!.

 

Crowd: OOOOOOOOOO SNAP

 

* from the backstage emerges the CEO of Skittles maker and punts the peacock off stage.

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Do you mean something along the lines of...

 

"Mother Nature's Baby is what we call this monster. The colors are out of this world! Electric and totally original shades of deep pearl green/royal blue/fiery violet/amber swirl all over the obverse. Picasso or the boldest Peacock in heat can't compare to the magical colors. The colors are so memorable too. We rank the colors an unheard of 100-yes 100 on our 1-10 scale (10 is the best). "

 

In this particular case, the effect it has on me is it makes me wonder how much the writer knows about peacocks in heat.

 

I'm not familiar with the coin or coin description, but it sounds like something that Legend would write. Of course, I think Legend's reputation overcomes some of the negativity that many collectors would impute due to overhyped descriptions. Either that or we (most of the posters commenting to this thread) are not representative of the larger collecting population on this issue.

 

As for the peacock analogy, I thought the males were the ones with the most bold/colorful feathers as a way to attract females. I would hope the writer would understand that heat (estrus) is a female trait. Whoever wrote this needs to take some biology and creative writing classes. It sounds like something made up by the Home Shopping Network.

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