Putting Your Twitter Followers on the Map, Literally

TweepsMap is an interesting Twitter app that will put your followers on a map of the world, literally.   It analyzes the percentage of total followers from countries, states, and cities. (here’s more about how it works)    While you can check out the profiles of your followers and find out where they’re from (if they filled out the location information), you can’t really get a snapshot.   When I analyzed my followers, I discovered that 60% were from outside the US (compared to 70% on Facebook)

So, I started to dig down and review the information country by country, continent by continent.  I shared the screen captures on my Facebook page.   Cindy Leonard asked a great question:  How come you don’t have any followers in Washington state?
I made a mistake, I didn’t give my data the sniff test before sharing it.     That’s some great advice from KD Paine for the last chapter of our forthcoming book,  “Measuring the Networked Nonprofit,” which is on data analysis and turning data in action.     So, look at every chart, every graph, every number and ask does it make sense.

So I asked on Twitter if there was anyone out there from Washington state – and a number of them responded back.     So, it looks like there is a glitch.    My colleague, Zan Mccolloch-Lussier, from Washington state suggested that the problem might be that is confuses Washington, DC with Washington state.
Despite a few glitches,  you use this tool to see if your audience is local or global.    What did you discover by putting your Twitter followers on the map?