How often should dealers update their online inventories?
RYK
Posts: 35,799 ✭✭✭✭✭
(Borrowing from Longacre 
) We all know that dealers are extremely busy buying and selling coins and often do not have time to update their online inventories real time (which is probably ideal for shoppers). Few things are more frustrating than finding a coin that you really, really want on a dealer's website, getting up the courage to phone or email this extremely busy numismatic professional, and learning that the coin was sold two weeks ago.
I would like to see dealers update their websites daily, and I also like to see a note that says something to the effect that the last update was on such-and-such a date. Absent that, at the very least, the date of the last update should be required. I also would like to see dealers indicate that coins are on hold, so I do not have to get worked up into a frothy frenzy thinking that I am going to be a new owner of a numismatic treasure, only to be deflated by being told that the coin has been sent out on approval and there are seven other folks in line in front of me if the coin does not stick where it is (which is about a 2% chance).
Anyone else have any thoughts on this?
) We all know that dealers are extremely busy buying and selling coins and often do not have time to update their online inventories real time (which is probably ideal for shoppers). Few things are more frustrating than finding a coin that you really, really want on a dealer's website, getting up the courage to phone or email this extremely busy numismatic professional, and learning that the coin was sold two weeks ago.I would like to see dealers update their websites daily, and I also like to see a note that says something to the effect that the last update was on such-and-such a date. Absent that, at the very least, the date of the last update should be required. I also would like to see dealers indicate that coins are on hold, so I do not have to get worked up into a frothy frenzy thinking that I am going to be a new owner of a numismatic treasure, only to be deflated by being told that the coin has been sent out on approval and there are seven other folks in line in front of me if the coin does not stick where it is (which is about a 2% chance).
Anyone else have any thoughts on this?
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Comments
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Tom Pilitowski
US Rare Coin Investments
800-624-1870
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
<< <i>Weekly >>
No way! I think it should be as often as possible. I like dealers that while at a show scan the coin to take it off their website. It is very frustrating to find a coin and then inquire to only be told it was sold. Take down the eye candy when it sells.
Harlan J. Berk, Ltd.
https://hjbltd.com/#!/department/us-coins
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
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<< <i>Weekly >>
No way! I think it should be as often as possible. I like dealers that while at a show scan the coin to take it off their website. It is very frustrating to find a coin and then inquire to only be told it was sold. Take down the eye candy when it sells. >>
Well, My paychecks come weekly. No use seeing a coin I don't have funds for!!
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<< <i>Weekly >>
No way! I think it should be as often as possible. I like dealers that while at a show scan the coin to take it off their website. It is very frustrating to find a coin and then inquire to only be told it was sold. Take down the eye candy when it sells. >>
Well, My paychecks come weekly. No use seeing a coin I don't have funds for!! >>
My paychecks are monthly, please dont put me through that pain!
Again, this would be a serious dealer.
The name is LEE!
Check out my current listings: https://ebay.com/sch/khunt/m.html?_ipg=200&_sop=12&_rdc=1
In honor of the memory of Cpl. Michael E. Thompson
I think a weekly update and a whats new page is acceptable. I admit to slacking at times. ANybody who can do better either has employees for this task or has retired and does it full time.
Edit: once a coin is sold and gone from the site, it is exactly that, gone from the site. I do not condone airlines overbooking seats, nor coin dealers selling the same coin twice. My software and website remove a coin when sold, it is no longer available for sale. I wish more would do this. It's just a simple click when setting preferances.
do it fairly infrequently. Some dealers just have great websites, and when an item is purchased
it is automatically removed from inventory. HJB is one of these that immediately comes to mind.
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<< <i>Weekly >>
No way! I think it should be as often as possible. I like dealers that while at a show scan the coin to take it off their website. It is very frustrating to find a coin and then inquire to only be told it was sold. Take down the eye candy when it sells. >>
Well, My paychecks come weekly. No use seeing a coin I don't have funds for!! >>
My paychecks are monthly, please dont put me through that pain! >>
You guys get paychecks? I still live at home and I think my mom calls it an "allowance"...but I only see it bi-weekly and only when I remember to do dishes and take out the garbage
I've been told I tolerate fools poorly...that may explain things if I have a problem with you. Current ebay items - Nothing at the moment
Steve
<< <i>Websites should be updated every time the status of an item changes.
Steve >>
Yep, I agree
When I am at a show, I update the website during the evening, so it is possible that a coin could be sold at a show early in the day and still show up as available until I update the site that evening.
So, I think I'm doing everything RYK is requesting.
An authorized PCGS dealer, and a contributor to the Red Book.
The dealer should post desirable coins at great prices and let them “mature” for a few weeks. After, deleting all of the inquiries, shredding letters and pre-payment checks, and erasing phone messages, the dealer should rotate the location of coins on the site. Move them to different categories, re-sort the pick lists, add links to dead URLs. This will engage the collectors who will frantically search for the coins they thought they could buy. With each level of obfuscation, the dealer should increase prices by 5%. Once the desired profit margin has been obtained, freeze the site and accept the first full-price offer for each coin. Repeat the process as necessary.
<< <i>Whenever I sell a coin, I update the website, placing "ON HOLD" next to the coin ordered. Once the customer has received and is satisfied with the coin, I change the status to "SOLD". I have the date updated on the homepage of my website, so if the date hasn't changed since the customer's last view, he/she needs to go no further. I change the Date Updated date whenever a coin is added to or deleted from the website, and/or when several coins are put ON HOLD. I don't change the Date Updated when only one or two coins are put on hold.
When I am at a show, I update the website during the evening, so it is possible that a coin could be sold at a show early in the day and still show up as available until I update the site that evening.
So, I think I'm doing everything RYK is requesting. >>
Rich, you are in compliance with the RYK standards.
Here's how my most frequented dealer websites stack up:
CRO and Doug Winter are in compliance. Both update regularly, often throughout the day, and indicate the date of the last update.
Mark Feld and Al Adams are in partial compliance. Both indicate the date of the last update but do not update daily.
Legend, Pinnacle, and John Kraljevech are not in compliance. None of these otherwise fine dealers indicate the date of the last update.
<< <i>Weekly >>
Garrow
<< <i>How often a dealer updates his/her website is an indication of how often they want potential buyers to visit. The longer the wait between updates/visits, the better the chance of losing customers altogether.
Garrow >>
That's a good point. The more frequently a dealer updates his/her site, the more often I visit.
Either that or she's curled up on the couch coughing up hairballs, since she has neither HTML skills nor opposable thumbs.
I wish I had more time to scan, describe, and put up all the interesting things I have in stock. I also wish I'd spent more than one consecutive week at home at any time in 2008, and that I was taller and better looking. We all have to make choices about how we spend our time -- so far mine has been best spent behind the table at coin shows, attending as many auctions as I can (including non-numismatic ones), and spending time on the phone and email with good clients who buy things and whom I can serve personally.
If I had part-time help to produce decent images, it would be much easier to keep updated. Loading the stuff to the website isn't bad, nor is writing descriptions of historically interesting items that I love playing with. It's the scanning, photographing, cropping, rotating, etc. that takes so much time (and, in the case of many pieces in my inventory, reduces the profit margin to zero or less). My office has neither room for another person to do these things, nor does my insurance company want me to send expensive things out to random folks to be photographed. Thus, it's on me. And I gotta sleep sometime.
Someday the website will be updated regularly. Until then, I'll keep setting up at shows and using a hands-on approach with customers rather than pretending to be a Rare Medals and Colonial Coin Online Superstore™. It's not the best way to reach everyone, but it's the only way my l'il one man operation has for the time being.
Betts medals, colonial coins, US Mint medals, foreign coins found in early America, and other numismatic Americana
<< <i>Actually, I think that JK is still setting up at Long Beach. >>
Hey, it takes a while to unwrap all that jeweler's tissue and set up those velvet trays!
Why don't you go shuffle some slabs or something
Betts medals, colonial coins, US Mint medals, foreign coins found in early America, and other numismatic Americana
Someday the website will be updated regularly....
John, don't sweat it. I like your style just the way it is. I was just teasing you about your website.
I know exactly how you feel. For a couple of years, I kept my collection on my own site for presentation purposes and felt a lot of internal pressure to do all of the things you mention to keep it up to date. After a while, I grew to hate the site (except for the display of Steelers photos
Besides, if you were too efficient at marketing your offerings, Longacre might beat me to the punch on some things, and I would not be able to handle that.
<< <i>Besides, if you were too efficient at marketing your offerings, Longacre might beat me to the punch on some things, and I would not be able to handle that.
So the Slow ‘n Steady Longacre Approach™ has cost me a few items?
Didn't wanna get me no trade
Never want to be like papa
Working for the boss every night and day
--"Happy", by the Rolling Stones (1972)
<< <i>John, don't sweat it. >>
What, me, worry?
Longacre -- I'm happy to call you when I see RYK's email pop up and give you first shot. Just don't tell RYK.
Betts medals, colonial coins, US Mint medals, foreign coins found in early America, and other numismatic Americana
Camelot
<< <i>As often as they change their shorts.
They go to a show with a $10 bill and one pair of shorts and don't change either one?