When selling your house, you need to keep in mind the "4 p's of marketing" - product, positioning, promotion and price. All of which feels antithetical when talking about a home. It's actually easier than you might imagine. For this article, I'd like to focus on one particular aspect - that of positioning. Who is the most likely buyer for your house? How do we tell them, or more importantly, SHOW them they are ideal for this house?

An effective, yet subtle approach is to use books, placed strategically, and angled just so... so you can read the title easily as you gaze around the space.

Books can suggest usage of a particular nook, or identify the level of "players" in the neighborhood, so that like-minded souls are attracted viscerally, subconsciously and emotionally.

Defining a Space

• Placing a cookbook in a kitchen is obvious. But if your house is perfect for entertaining, then put out a book about entertaining - more than recipes, the themes, the plans, the checklists... there are lots of books like that out there. Even one from the library tells the story.
• Putting a dictionary or book of quotes on a desk suggests writing, be it for work or pleasure
• A "potboiler" in a hammock, or a soft comfy chair, shows a relaxing, quite space where someone in the family sneaks off to catch some respite.

Defining A Lifestyle

• Golf is the easy one, and those books are always on sale at Big Box Stores, Barnes and Noble, etc.
• Travel books speak to an affluent, relaxed lifestyle - and look pretty on a coffee table in the living room
• Fun "books" are magazines on topics like wine, cigars, flying, yachting, skydiving... all pleasurable pursuits that attract a "move up" buyer

Attracting a Particular Niche

• I've written of this before, but it bears repeating. If you live in an area ideal for dog walking, display dog books. Similarly with horses.
• Some towns have major festivals around a certain niche - bike riding, a midnight hike to a spiritual place, etc. Books in that genre will go a long way to illustrate that this home will support someone who shares the interest.

Lastly, the books by the bedside are key! Try not to have sex manuals, or "how to get out of debt quick", "How to protect your kids in divorce" "how to relocate to Alaska" or anything that might give away any kind of negotiating edge you might lose should the other side know that much about you. Pick two paperbacks at the top of the New York Times Bestseller list - one fiction and one non-fiction - and you'll look "up to date"!

"Hey," senses the buyer, "these folks keep up on stuff: their house has likely been kept up to date, too!"