It was the bite felt around the world, and marketing-savvy companies rushed to capitalize on the media frenzy around it. If you haven’t heard of the incident (is that really possible?), I’m talking about the now infamous bite that Uruguay forward Luis Suarez took out of Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini.

With millions of people watching the games in real time and discussing it on social media, companies seized the opportunity to join the boisterous online conversation with some cheeky thoughts of their own.

One of the online communities favorite comments, with 65,000 retweets, was McDonald’s “Hey Suarez, if you’re hungry, come get a bite of a Big Mac.” Even the United State’s own Major League Baseball chimed in with a “There’s no crying #biting in baseball.” The comments kept coming, from Snickers picture of their candy bar titled “More satisfying than Italian” to the cute JCPenney tweet of a pint-sized vampire “Fangs for the memories, Uruguay.”

Then as the FIFA controversy continued (was it a bite? was it not?) and the online conversation wound down, the print ads began. My favorite? The Philips AirFloss ad touting they can help you with that bit of Italian stuck in your teeth. Classic.

The moral of the story? No matter your business size, make sure to capitalize on almost any current event to help grab a piece of the attention for your company – for FREE. The only cost? Keep your sense of humor handy!