Last week on The Collective.

What a fun week getting to celebrate my birthday with you. I’m going to have to think of another, even more cool way to do it again in 2012. I’m excited to celebrate Thanksgiving with you all next week (no super deals, but good articles are coming)!

Monday

Yes. It’s my birthday! My gift for you.

The Sparkle Marketing campaign for only $38 – that’s a savings of over 87%. Get all the details in this post.

Tuesday

A year of lessons in creativity, business & life.

I took a post to catalog a few of the things I learned during my 37th year. I settled on 6: Be intentional, hard work, life, know who you are, learn & grow, beginning. Looking forward to sharing another year with you.

A Hand-written touch to your business pt 4

Lori Nordstrom wrapped up her series on incorporating the hand-written note into your workflow. She shares another sample and her thoughts on referrals.

Wednesday

Are your clients your friends? They should be.

It can at times be a hard line to draw. How close should you be with your clients? I think you need to call many of them friends. 3 reasons why.

Want to improve your business? Improve your service.

It’s easiest to work to improve your business by improving your product (your images). Your client cares more about your service. What are you doing to improve it?

Thursday

Marketing to high school seniors. Tell a story.

I was reminded of the power of telling a story in your marketing while watching a Heineken commercial. I was also reminded of the desire of all kids feel older.

My best posts (you may have missed).

A quick update to a few of my recent guest posts. I was featured on Tiffinbox.org on Thursday. Check out my post on the 3 things that makes you a professional.

Friday

Hard work or working hard?

Believe it or not, there is a difference. I mentioned the importance of hard work in my post Tuesday morning, but it needs a bit of clarification. Which are you doing?

Cool links of the week:

If you want more than what you see here, make sure to follow me on Twitter. I share lots more there throughout the entire week.

• Be human – you need to present yourself as human to your clients. Video is a good way to do this.
• Twitter changes – Twitter made a few updates to your profile page. What it looks like now.
• Evernote infographic – use Evernote? Here are some interesting stats and info you should know (whether you use Evernote or not).