Saturday, May 29, 2010

Are Virtual Crops Coming to Life?

Good news FarmVille and Mafia Wars lovers- soon you can really take a bite out of your games- no really! According to “Digits,” the Wall Street Journal's technology blog, Zynga, the creator of our favorite addicting facebook games, is teaming up with 7-Eleven to bring the games from your screen to the store. This means that certain items you purchase at 7-Eleven will be accompanied by access codes that you can redeem online for goods in the popular Zynga games.

For all of you who scoff at friends watering crops or feeding their baby eagle, consider these figures: in 2009 the sale of virtual goods in social games brought in $336 million of revenue for Zynga. This figure is projected to quadruple to $2.1 billion by 2012.

7-Eleven is notorious for promoting movie and charity campaigns, but this partnership signifies the growing popularity and buying power of not only social media, but also social media games. The idea for the partnership developed after 7-Eleven retailers began selling FarmVille, Mafia Wars and YoVille gift cards in their stores. When sales of these gift cards skyrocketed, Zynga and 7-Eleven decided to capitalize on the concept of virtual goods and real goods coming together.

What this really proves to all of us is that whether we are talking about the virtual world or the real world, money is money and it is good for anything anywhere. The promotion is set to begin June 1 and run through July 15. For more information, you can read the Wall Street Journal blog post here.


This guest blog was written by PRowl staff member Michele Reilley.

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