Ask anyone you know about the most popular game on Facebook, they’ll tell you FarmVille. If you’re like me, you’ll roll your eyes in disgust knowing how time-wasting the game is. However, I decided to look for the principles taught in the game and how they can be applied to the real world – you know, outside of Facebook. And yes, I think FarmVille does serve a purpose.
The premise of FarmVille is that you grow your farm by tending to the land, growing crops, harvesting crops and earning points for it. It’s collaborative, so the more friends you have, the more likely you’ll be successful.
Sadly, I don’t have many friends who play FarmVille, so this is what my farm looks like:
So… while playing FarmVille, I discovered that you are given finite resources. You can only plow so much, harvest so much and you’re one person doing it. This is the plight of the entrepreneur.
There are three principles in FarmVille that translate to the real-world as it applies to business and entrepreneurship:
Manage Your Resources.
You can’t spend what you don’t have. Just like in business, you need to wisely invest your resources, keeping your marketing fertile so prospects can grow into customers.
Build Strong Relationships.
FarmVille encourages users to partner up and join farms of their friends. Doing so allows you to earn and pool resources together. In the business world, it’s important to forge strong relationships with peers in your industry so you can pool resources together and help each other out.
Set Clear Objectives.
As you grow your farm, you earn points and rewards. To do so, you need to accomplish certain objectives along the way. Business is no different, you can’t shoot for “more money” … it’s like hoping for a “better farm.” With clear objectives, you will be able grow your business systematically, sustainably and comfortably.
FarmVille isn’t exactly a “business” application; I am happy to see entrepreneurship lives as one of the guiding principles of the game. Perhaps someone who runs the best, highest-producing farm will also start their own business and subconsciously apply what they learned from FarmVille.
Are you the farmer who plows the farm, spreads the seed *and* harvests the crops? If only there was a way to automate those activities, the farmer can focus on growing the farm, not plowing it. Many business owners face this everyday – they wear three or four different hats just to keep the business running. It’s no wonder they’re not growing their farm, they’re just maintaining it.
Luckily, we’ve got a cool app to put the marketing, customer database and billing activities on auto-pilot for a business. And the best part is … you don’t have to wait for your crops to grow to reap the benefits.
Do you play FarmVille? What other lessons does FarmVille teach that are valuable to entrepreneurs?
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FarmVille is a registered trademark of Zynga Game Network, Inc.
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