Hi there,
On the December Jolla Phone update we noted of a referral program we’re planning to announce to help reach 10k pre-orders milestone, which also unlocks the The Other Half innovation program. It has come time to conclude and move forward.
There’s been some discussion that the daily pre-order rate has dropped since December, something that was naturally to be expected. The pre-orders are anyway cumulating nicely every day (~7,300 by now!), and we think we all are very positively taken on the overall interest for the project - and far more pre-orders than initially expected or many of us even dared to dream!
For us and for the liveliness of the whole community this project already has been a real turning point and brought Sailfish back to the minds of like-minded people, some that may have been early-days Jolla users, and even more totally new members to the community. Speaking of that, let’s share some interesting stats:
- more than 50% are new customers, i.e. the community has grown significantly and you can certainly notice that also here in the forum with new nicknames appearing frequently - welcome all newcomers!
- Sailfish Forum visitors statistics were up 150% from November to December
- we’ve got over 410,000 visitors in the product page since the launch. That is a lot!
The referral program and 10k milestone
We asked for feedback for the referral program and what the “rewards” should be within our community. Many favoured for the overall good for the whole community, rather than e.g. personal monetary incentives such as shopping discounts. A special T-shirt was naturally brought up.
As we are seeing a strongly growing number of new Sailfish users joining the boat or thinking to join, there is a positive problem: we are getting a lot of new, or potential, interested users who don’t have previous experience on Sailfish OS, or even with any other alternative to the mainstream platforms. In particular we often get questions whether certain (Android) app, such as a critical banking or a government ID, work with Sailfish OS and with the new Jolla Phone.
This is a deal braker for many considering to pre-order. Like many know, unfortunately a lot of these apps, while at the core Europe, are dependant on Google Play Services. At the same time, with the help of microG, most still install, can be launched and operated. Some, unfortunately, won’t even launch or have trouble in the initial setup. At the same time, for us it is quite impossible to test most of them simply due to the fact that we don’t have customer or citizenship in most of the market areas.
There are a couple of good community-driven posts/wikis in this forum that detail e.g. the feasibility of banking apps in Sailfish OS. For newcomers this maybe too far to reach, and thus our specific Call-To-Action request for all interested members is to help produce use case videos of daily use of Sailfish OS. If you feel making one, you may include your personal referral code and we’re happy to promote/onboard those through official Jolla channels to get traction. Similarly, and if you’re not a fan of referrals, it always helps to share any daily Sailfish use examples in any format!
What Jolla pledges as a result of successful referral results and reaching 10k is to also organise a series of Sailfish Community Meetups - think it like a roadshow we’re committed to host several meetups throughout the year in locations close by the local communities. We may count the first one to be the upcoming Sailfish Meetup in FOSDEM (Jan 31, Brussels) and further ones to be planned down the road. If you’re interested to have one around your area and possibly helping to organise locally, let us/community moderators know with pm. We can’t promise we can organise all the requested ones but we pledge to do as many as feasible.
Further, if you get in minimum three (3) pre-orders using your personal referral code, you’ve earned yourself a special 
Jolla Ambassador T-shirt . You may choose your preference of black or white, and naturally the size.
Every referral counts and we need your help on achieving the 10k mark - we remain confident we can make it together 
To claim your referral code, click here to send us an email. Let’s make it fly 
together!
Some have also noted in the forum that it would be good to let the campaign run over upcoming FOSDEM. That is a very good point, and it also took a bit more than expected from us to come up with the referral program, so we have decided to extend the 10k challenge until end of February, 2026.
