iOS App of the Day: Ban.jo

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Keeping track of what your friends are doing throughout all of your social networks can sometimes feel like a full-time job. You have to constantly stalk Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Google Plus, or Instagram for updates on your friend’s activities throughout the day. However, for some people you might just want to know when your friends are nearby so you can actually meet up and socialize in person. On the other hand, some people may only be interested in what their friends are up to in California while they’re freezing in Alaska. That’s where Ban.jo comes in handy. The app connects to your favorite social network accounts and sends you a push notification when a friend is within the radius that you specified. And for the times that you don’t want to be alerted you can simply turn off or pause the notifications with one tap. For all our social savvy readers out there, this app is worth checking out.

Pros:

  • See updates from all of your favorite social networks
  • Push notifications for when friends are nearby
  • Set alert to your preference 1/4 mile- 10 mile radius
  • Support for Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, Google +, Instagram, LinkedIn
  • See a Map View of your friends
  • Search by interests

Cons:

  • Busy interface
  • Does not replace standalone apps
  • Takes time to completely set up and add all your social networks
How it works:
After downloading Ban.Jo you will need to decide which of your social networks you want to log in with. You will also need to allow the app to use your location and then you can sign in either using Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Gmail or LinkedIn. You will have the option to add other social networks after you sign into Ban.Jo. The app’s dashboard gives you the following options to help navigate through the service:
  • Friends: A live feed of your friends updates with photos and a map view with friend icon view
  • Community: Provides a map view of friends near your location, a list view of friends, and a grid of photos
  • Interests: Search interests by typing in a keyword
  • Notifications: First you will have to invite friends to receive notifications. You can invite contacts via your address book, Facebook, Twitter, or email.
  • You can then set notifications to alert you when your friends are  anywhere between a 1/mile away to 10 miles away from your current location. If you want you can select certain friends that you do not want to receive notifications about and you can also pause notifications all together.
  • Social: Here you can additional social networks to connect to more friends through the app
  • Invite: You can invite contacts via your address book, Facebook, Twitter, and email
  • Profile: Here you can personalize your banjo profile you can view who has looked at your profile, add and search for friends, block users, and see your personal viewing history.
Conclusion:
I was drawn to Ban.jo because I really liked the fact that one app could aggregate all of your social media sites down to one place. I enjoyed the flexibility that Ban.jo provided with an interest search and a cool map view of my friends all around the world.The app does take some time getting set up and getting used to. The more social networks you are involved in the longer it takes to set up Ban.Jo, but once you have it working for you it really does make being “social” a little easier. The app itself could appear to be busy for some people but I eventually got used to it. The dashboard makes it easier to work your way through Ban.jo and stalk your friends faster. Being active in more than three social network sites myself I appreciate what this app does by streamlining everything to one place. I still go back to my standalone apps depending on what mood I’m in, but Ban.Jo is absolutely worth a second look for anyone who has more than one social network that they are actively involved in.
Ban.jo is available for free in the iTunes Store. Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.Requires iOS 4.3 or later. iTunes Link

This is part of our iOS App of the Day series. We take our favorite app for iOS for each day and post it here for you to check out. Feel free to check out all of our App of the Day posts here.

2 thoughts on “iOS App of the Day: Ban.jo”

  1. Ellis

    Hi Amy, thanks for this great post on Banjo! We’re really excited you found value in using Banjo to aggregate all your biggest social networks. We just recently integrated LinkedIn as well. There’s a lot more coming soon and we’re excited for our growth (one million members in 9 months)! Feel free to reach out to us anytime!

    Ellis
    Community Manager, Banjo

    Reply

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