Another thing freelance writers should bring to networking events

Most of these events also have a time where they give away doorprizes provided by the attendees.

You'll see some great goodies: t-shirts, mugs, baked goods (yup), bottles of wine, bouquets of flowers, kitchen stuff (from Pampered Chef folks), makeup (Arbonne!), and my favorite - gift certificates from massage therapists.

So what should you bring?

Why not create a gift certificate for a free press release? Or a yourhub.com article if you've got that in your area. On the envelope, mark the value, what it is, who it's from. On the certificate, include what it is, how the recipient can use it, and an expiration date.

Half the time, the recipient doesn't ever get "it" together enough to take advantage of it - but either way, you've got some good publicity, and people see what you do and how much it costs.