Hootsuite.com has made it easy to manage your social networks and keep your sanity doing it. The site offers more than just a website link shortener for users to utilize.

The Twitter focused site lets you add and update your social networks including Facebook, WordPress, LinkedIn, Myspace and Ping.fm.

This site has recently streamlined its interface to make it easier to use. You can now customize your streams, tabs and columns on the dashboard.

The Professional Podcasts offer a broad range of public relations and communications services to help clients enhance their professional image. We have extensive expertise in new media technologies and “social media” such as blogging, podcasting, social network sites, and microblogging tools like Twitter.

Q) Tell us a little bit about your site. What inspired you to start it?

A) I’m a former corporate PR guy. Left the corporate world at the end of 2004, and realized after listening to many podcasts that there was a lot of poor quality production being done. I had background in radio, and know how to produce and edit news stories for radio. I learned digital tools and began focusing on podcasting as the core competency of my consultancy.

Ariel Hyatt founded Ariel Publicity & Cyber PR and her firm has worked with over 1,000 musicians and bands of all genres. Her company is now 100% digital and helps artists increase their online exposure. Sign Up here:http://www.arielpublicity.com. Follow Hyatt on Twitter @cyberpr.

It happened a few weeks ago in Australia.  I was standing at the opening cocktail reception for APRA’s Song Summit Music Conference overlooking Darling Harbor in Sydney, and I was chatting with a perfect stranger (who it turns out is a very famous Australian musician with quite a few top 10 hits in Oz).  Noting my foreign accent he asks “What brings you here?” “I teach artists about online marketing and social media.”  I answer sheepishly, because this news is not always met with elated enthusiasm.

Did any of you follow the whole Old Spice Man nuttiness that went down a few weeks ago? Old Spice used the online popularity of their recent commercials to stage a social media blitz. They invited users from all the major social networks on the web to ask questions to the Old Spice Man, and he answered them via YouTube videos.

The unique thing about the Old Spice Man videos was the speed with which they were released. Someone asked a question on Twitter, and minutes later, a hilarious video response was up on YouTube. Social media experts say this campaign was so successful because there is an ever-growing demand for live and real-time video online.

What Does This Have To Do With Music?

We’ve finally hit that point where our computers and internet connections are fast enough for live streaming video to actually be successful. And people love it. The reality and the intimacy of this type of connection – not just with friends, but with brands and celebrities and political figures – is slated to be the next big thing. Which is why it’s time for musicians to get on board.

And yes, we’ve seen it before. Big media companies and businesses have been hosting live feeds of concerts online since 1996 (Free Tibet!), and DJs have been webcasting jams and shows on video streaming platforms for a while. But now the time is ripe for independent artists hosting live video events, DIY style. No “And now, the iPad brings you Bon Jovi!” brand sponsorship necessary.

Attention indie  bands and artists, Headliner.fm wants to help you connect with other musicians and ultimately reach new fans and better promote your music. The website is a “promotion exchange” for bands and artists to help build awareness for each other.

Bands who sign-up on Headliner are able to join forces with and promote other bands on each other’s Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace profiles. Members are rewarded a number of “band bucks” (proportionate to how many followers they have on their social media sites) which can be used to buy requests from other bands to give your band promotion on their social media profiles.

You’ve just come together as a band and you’re ready to gig. But when you approach clubs to play they want to know where you’ve played in their market before and what kind of draw you usually bring. (Draw means how many paying fans usually come to one of your shows.)

If you’re a new band then your answer would be “we haven’t played before so we don’t really know how many paying fans will come.” And you know what will happen with that answer. They’ll tell you to come back when you have a fan base.

You’re thinking, “Yeah, but we’re such a great band your customers will love us.” The reality is clubsdon’t have customers, bands have customers. People go to a certain club to see a certain band. They don’t go to the Club X instead of Club Y because of the club; they go there because of the band that will be playing.

Social media is the buzz phrase of the web today, however, ask any two web professionals what “social media” actually is and you will get two differing answers. In fact, social media means different things to different people including the most important group of all, the users.

Users are bringing change to the web because of how their web surfing habits are evolving. This is leading to new and creative ways to satisfy the changing demands for how information and content is searched and used.

Social Media Defined

The World Wide Web was conceived as a medium for information exchange between users, however, it is only with the advent of Social Media innovations this has become reality for ordinary users as individuals and collectives including businesses. Social Media is not defined by “What It Is” but more by “What It Does” – it is the enablement of any user to share information whether uploading it to the web for others or viewing and downloading content for their own use.

Myspace continues to streamline their Web site to try and keep up with features on other social networks. The latest update is the “Share” function that now allows you to apply a link and video to your status updates.

Instead of having to choose a “Mood” to update your status, Myspace has updated their design to match the rest of the profile’s home page; while adding the options to apply a photo, link, video and mood to your status.

This is just the latest in updates and moves by Myspace to stay afloat in social media. The site recently updated the “Stream” of your status posts and bulletins in an attempt to organize their many features.

Cowboy Cantor is a podcast run by a Portuguese music teacher. Its the only podcast around the island of S. Miguel, in the Azores islands, Portugal. The show’s aim is to share the greatest free mp3s found on the Internet, in the artist’s own sites, their label sites, or in many other mp3 sites that offer free music. It’s all done with love and in the name of independent music.

Q) What can artists do to make money on the internet?

A) A lot of different things have been happening on the Internet with music. From stores with d.r.m. files, to free music. From the Creative Commons to pay what you want. From file sharing on chats to illegal peer to peer clients. Everyday we meet new ways of promoting music and selling it. It is fact, legal or illegal, Internet is the most effective way of getting an artist to be known. Labels and artists should keep that in mind and work with it. F.M. and A.M. radios, television, newspapers and magazines still have a word to say on this process, but Internet is vital these days for music promotion.

At one point, artists really needed to rely on getting a recording contract or having a top management firm such as Violator Management to work their contacts and make a deal happen for the artist. This is a first hand account of how to build your own career in order to get a deal offered to you similar to Drake’s $2.5 Million deal from Young Money/Cash Money/Universal Records.

If you do NOT have a home studio to produce and at least reference tracks, I would start by doing this first. This will stop you from being at the mercy of any producers when you want to jump in a studio because you are creative. Creativity can hit at any moment to an artist. To be dependent upon a producer to get into their studio will hinder you and stop the creativity because you can’t just jump in and create music at will.

Q: How can contemporary artists make more money on the internet?

A: Models like what Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails, and Mark Mosher have given potential buyers a choice of what a particular song or album should be priced at. Their success along with keeping things drm free encourages fans to obtain works from the artists. Perhaps if artists gave fans the chance to rate individual songs or the entire album as a whole, then a higher rating could mean that fans are more likely to purchase the work. An option would be to cap the price at around $15.00 for the CD and $5.00 for the digital download. If the rating goes down, the cap should be lowered along side this.

Q: Where do you see the next trend in social media? What else can be done in terms of having an online conversation? What is the next “What are you doing?” question?