A personal message from FrontlineSMS Founder, Ken Banks

As we approach the end of 2011, there is opportunity for us to reflect on a successful year at FrontlineSMS, reveal some news and reach out to you - our users - to share your thoughts through our survey so that we can carry on innovating. Recently we sent out a personal message from FrontlineSMS Founder, Ken Banks, via our e-newsletter list and we wanted to share it again here with readers of our blog: Photo: Karola Riegler Photography

Hello,

It's been a while since I was last in touch, and much has been happening in the world of FrontlineSMS. As we approach the end of another year I thought now might be a good time to reach out, share some exciting news, and ask you one small favour.

Exciting news!

Organisationally, the past twelve months have seen considerable growth. We now employ a dozen staff across three continents - Africa, Europe and North America - and the number of software downloads has exceeded the 20,000 mark, powering non-profit projects in twenty sectors in over 70 countries around the world. We've also had a successful year redesigning the platform (further news on that in the new year) and have also been working on versions of FrontlineSMS tailor-made for our :Radio and :Credit projects and their users. As the year closes out we've also managed to secure new funding to allow us to continue to develop the platform, and to continue to support you - our users - in the work that you do.

Share your views on FrontlineSMS

That leads me onto my request for a small favour. It would be great if you could share your views and experiences with FrontlineSMS in our 2011 user survey. Our online survey is crucial in helping us understand how FrontlineSMS is being used, problems you may have had, things you like, areas we can improve, and the impact the platform is having on you and your work. We've managed to continue to provide FrontlineSMS (and full technical support) free to everyone because we have been able to share this information with donors and supporters, helping them to be better informed about the positive impact their software is having.

In today's mobile world it's crucial that we understand our impact, and that we're able to communicate that to the people who support us. This is how we're able to support you. To give you an idea of how useful it is for us to know about your experiences, check out the results from the survey we ran earlier this year. This information has been crucial in helping us secure funding to continue operating into 2012, so thank you to everyone who contributed.

It would be great if you could take a few minutes of your time to fill out our 2011 user survey which will help us continue our work, which in turn helps you continue yours.

Win a FrontlineSMS T-shirt and feature in our National Geographic blog series!

As a show of appreciation, if you complete the survey you'll be in with a chance of winning a limited edition FrontlineSMS T-shirt! There may also be the opportunity to have your project featured on our National Geographic Mobile Message blog series, giving you the chance to share your work with a global audience of millions.

So please take a moment to fill out our user survey today!

Thanks so much for your time, and for the work that you do for millions of people in need around the world. We're excited and honoured to be working with you, and look forward to continuing our partnership into the new year.

Wishing you all the very best,
Ken Banks, FrontlineSMS Founder