for some, it is hype.
but hype will just kill a coin because people insta dump it once the hype train is over, and if coin is not properly protected, it will also be dead hash-wise once the multipools jump off the coin and leave you with a sky high difficulty.
Hype should be organic and grow with the community, if the coin is good by itself it doesn't need extra hype to grow.
That being said, good dev team is a must and then a fair no pre-mine launch is another good factor to ensure the success of a coin. Just look at KDC for example, devs are buying up their own coin because they didn't pre-mine, contrary to what most coins do that pre-mine 1-3% and then dump most of that onto the first exchange that accepts the coin.
I think active and committed dev's are very important for the value of a coin too.