IT WILL BE a busy 2006 for the advertising world, as Irish companies vie for a slice of the spending unlocked by maturing SSIA accounts. But will the prospect of clutter herald a boom in relevance advertising?

Perhaps not, but the year ahead is certainly likely to focus the minds of advertisers wanting to target audiences in a busy market.

Paul Moran, managing director of Mediaworks, said his agency has been "banging the drum" about relevance advertising for years now, and he believes it will become a more prominent feature of the advertising market in years to come.

He cites Today FM's campaign on Dublin's Dart lines as a good example of relevance advertising as being, in playing on the fact that people are stuck on carriages and tailoring the message closely to the external environment.

Moran admits that this approach won't be suitable for every company, but believes it is the way to go.

Steve Shanahan, chief executive of the Institute of Advertising Practitioners in Ireland, believes relevance marketing is a growing feature of the Irish landscape as a natural consequence of the relatively complex way the Irish market has evolved in the past number of years.

"Twenty years ago you could take a fist full of ads and throw them at RTE, the Irish Independent and The Irish Times and you'd have hit your target audience, " he said. "You can't do that anymore."

Shanahan foresees 2006 as a possible test run for some advertisers gearing up for the majority of SSIA maturation in 2007.

He said this year's FIFA World Cup, even without Ireland having qualified for Germany, will still be a significant draw for viewers and readers, many of whom will have a keen interest in following the fortunes of England and a new soccer nemesis, Switzerland.

IN&M TO TEST INDY TITLE IN INDIA

IN&M intends to launch a facsimile edition of its London Independent title in India during the summer.

Speaking in an interview with India's Financial Express, Independent News & Media chief executive Tony O'Reilly said that an initial print run will be between 8,000 and 10,000 copies - a minuscule volume in such a large country.

The paper will be priced "aggressively" and that it will be made available in "metro cities and embassies", he added.

Last year IN&M acquired a 26% stake in Jagran Prakashan, the publisher of the Hindi newspaper, Dainik Jagran. O'Reilly said he does not foresee any further direct investment in India by IN&M. He added that he is "keenly" watching developments in the newly liberalised Indian FM radio market, but stressed that any further investments would be made through the Jagran group.

MIELE MAKES RETURN TO ADVERTISING

FRAY MIELE IRELANDmakes a television appearance after two years with a 1.5m campaign set to run over the course of the year.

The adverts for a new vacuum cleaner will feature in three bursts in 2006 and are airing on RTE, TV3, TG4, UTV, Sky and E4 during January. The campaign was devised by First Advertising (formerly BBC), which is also the media buyer.

Meanwhile, Meteor kicks off a new campaign on Tuesday with its successful female double act. The "multi-million" euro campaign will see adverts being aired every 15 minutes on RTE1, RTE 2, TV3, Sky One, E4 and MTV, from 6pm to 11pm on Tuesday, amounting to 150 slots.

QMP Publicis took over as Meteor's creative agency last January. The media buyer is Vizeum.

CRAZY FROG JUMPS IN WITH 66M SPEND

SOMEWHAT incredible statistics during the week from Nielsen Research that showed the company behind the irritating mobile phone ringtone phenomenon, Crazy Frog, spent a whopping 66m on advertising in the UK last year.

That spend propelled the company behind the frog, Jamster, to being the 22nd biggest advertising spender in 2005. The company spent less than 60,000 on internet advertising, with over 40m being spent on TV and the remainder on press.

The British ringtone market is thought to be worth almost 200m per annum, and Crazy Frog took almost one-third of that consumer spend last year. Its success surely means the advent of even more annoying tunes.