Faith Cedela
.png)
Here's a thought that should keep every PR pro up at night: your customers are probably doing something brilliant with your product right now, and you have no clue it's happening.
McDonald's figured this out when they discovered people were topping McNuggets with caviar. Not because some agency brainstormed "What if we made fast food fancy?" but because people were already doing it. The brand spotted it through social listening during the U.S. Open, watched Rihanna try it, saw it show up in search behavior, and thought: "Huh. Maybe we should pay attention to this."
Liz Fernandez, McDonald's director of brand communications, put it perfectly: "We don't approach campaigns asking ourselves, 'Is this a good idea?' We ask if it's true."
That's the difference between PR that feels forced and PR that feels inevitable.
THE PLAYBOOK THAT ACTUALLY WORKS
McDonald's and Golin Ketchum didn't try to manufacture a moment. They amplified one that already existed. They created 750 free McNugget Caviar kits for Valentine's Day — complete with nuggets, Paramount Caviar, crème fraiche, and a $25 gift card. No paid media. Just pure earned attention.
The results? The kits sold out in under two minutes. Over 6 million people hit McNuggetCaviar.com. "McNugget Caviar" became the top trending topic on X. During launch week, they got 4,400 media placements and 13.8 billion in social reach.
People were reselling the free kits on eBay for over $300. When your campaign creates a black market, you've probably done something right.
But here's what I love most about this: McDonald's only regret was not making more kits. Meg Farquhar from Golin Ketchum noted that Google Trends showed "chicken caviar" searches peaked in February, right when they launched. They weren't chasing a trend — they were riding one that already had momentum.
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOUR PR STRATEGY
Stop trying to invent the next viral moment. Start paying attention to the moments already happening.
Your customers are using your product in ways you never intended. They're combining it with things that make no sense to you but perfect sense to them. They're having conversations about your brand that you're not part of — yet.
The smartest PR pros I know spend more time listening than creating. They track search patterns, monitor social conversations, and look for behaviors that are gaining momentum organically. Then they ask: Can we make this easier? More fun? More shareable?
Fernandez's team has a simple approach: "The team is constantly mining for interesting fan behaviors and finding a role for the brand that feels additive, not forced." That last part matters. Your job isn't to hijack what customers are doing — it's to enhance it.
This works even if you don't have McDonald's scale. Watch how people actually use your product when you're not directing them. Look for repeated behaviors. Find the weird, unexpected use cases that keep showing up. Those aren't bugs — they're features you haven't discovered yet.
The McNugget Caviar campaign moved faster than McDonald's expected because it was built on something real. When you're amplifying authentic behavior instead of manufacturing artificial buzz, everything accelerates.
Ready to stop guessing what your audience wants and start discovering what they're already doing? We help brands find those authentic moments worth amplifying. Let's talk about what your customers are telling you that you're not hearing yet.
This post was originally inspired by Behind the iconic McNuggets with caviar campaign via prdaily. We encourage you to read the original piece for full context.