Ascribing a financial value to editorial media coverage has always been a bit of a challenge for agencies and in-house PR teams alike. Many just measure the physical size of the article, calculate what it would have cost to place an advert of a similar size, and multiply that by 3 (or a similar, rather arbitrary figure to take into account the implied endorsement value of editorial over advertising).

There have been attempts to make the process a bit more scientific, with media analysis software that takes into account variables such as the number and prominence of product mentions and whether the article was, in government speak, 'on message'. But this sort of software still relies on the subjective opinion of the user, rendering it largely useless in my opinion.

A story by holiday cruise company Ocean Village, widely reported at the end of May, highlights one of the problems. It commissioned a survey which found, amongst other things, that Britons laugh 3 times less than they did in the 1950s. Now, on the face of it, that's a great idea for a survey. Bound to generate media interest. And indeed it did. What's more, I'm quite certain that if you ran the coverage through media analysis software, it would tell you that the story was worth gazillions to Ocean Village in media exposure.

But when I first saw the story in the Daily Mail, all I read was that Ocean Village found we laugh less these days. Er. And? Did I drop everything, rush to the telephone and block book ten year's worth of holiday cruises? Er. No. In fact, I was left rather more bemused than amused: why would a holiday cruise company have any interest in whether I laugh more or less now than I would have done (had I been alive), in the 1950s.

I investigated further - something I wouldn't have done without the benefit of professional curiosity - and the raison d'etre became clear: Ocean Village has just launched a laughter therapy holiday; a cruise during which passengers will be offered comedy workshops and laughter yoga sessions. Notwithstanding the fact that "laughter yoga sessions" sound like a bit of an oxymoron to me, that's a clever idea, and it'll be interesting to see whether it takes off.

But how good was the idea of a laughter survey to promote the service? Well, despite the fact that the national newspapers largely failed to report the solution to falling laughter levels in the UK (i.e. we should all go on an Ocean Village laughter cruise immediately), I have no doubt that the survey will have generated a considerable amount of media coverage elsewhere that did. Enough, I'd imagine, to cover the cost of the exercise many times over. And then there's the considerable value of general brand awareness generated, even by the Daily Mail. So yes, it was a very good idea. Was it brilliance? No. For that, the laughter cruises would have somehow had to be integrated into the survey itself, such that it would be impossible for a journalist to write the story without mentioning them.

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