Fastest growing destinations on Twitter
Yesterday we published our monthly ranking of US tourism organizations on Twitter. Over the next days we will analyze the data some more and see if Twitter is really having an impact on tourism or if it just a fad.
In this post we rank the 50 destinations that picked up the most followers in December of 08.
Pennylvania picked up almost 500 new followers, followed by Cleveland and Chicagoland.
Soon several DMOs will have more than 1,000 followers and if you look at the average number of daily updates this means that it will be possible to make several thousand contacts with consumes every day.
| Rank Dec | Destinations | Change Followers | Average updates / day | Followers / Updates Ratio |
| 1 | paadventure | 491 | 3.6 | 3.8 |
| 2 | PositivelyCleve | 392 | 6.1 | 1.9 |
| 3 | VisitChicago | 319 | 7.6 | 2.5 |
| 4 | lehighvalleypa | 307 | 7.6 | 1.5 |
| 5 | SpringfieldCVB | 229 | 6.1 | 2.1 |
| 6 | TravelOregon | 211 | 7.2 | 0.7 |
| 7 | enjoyillinois | 209 | 3.1 | 2.1 |
| 8 | TravelPortland | 208 | 4.1 | 1.8 |
| 9 | ScottsdaleAZ | 207 | 1.8 | 3.7 |
| 10 | visitflorida | 184 | 4.5 | 0.7 |
| 11 | ArizonaTourism | 165 | 2.8 | 1.9 |
| 12 | BaltimoreMD | 146 | 6.5 | 1.5 |
| 13 | visitphilly | 146 | 5.6 | 0.8 |
| 14 | MeetMinneapolis | 144 | 2.0 | 2.6 |
| 15 | GrandRapidsCVB | 138 | 1.5 | 2.8 |
| 16 | ExpCols | 106 | 12.1 | 0.4 |
| 17 | whatcomcounty | 105 | 2.2 | 1.2 |
| 18 | ColumbiaMOCVB | 103 | 3.5 | 1.3 |
| 19 | WilliamsportPA | 100 | 0.2 | 21.9 |
| 20 | renotahoe | 98 | 1.1 | 4.1 |
| 21 | discover_la | 97 | 2.7 | 0.8 |
| 22 | VisitFairfax | 87 | 1.3 | 1.9 |
| 23 | flee2thecleve | 85 | 2.4 | 1.1 |
| 24 | VisitIndiana | 84 | 4.0 | 0.5 |
| 25 | ColumbiaSC | 79 | 0.9 | 2.2 |
| 26 | InsideSonoma | 70 | 3.6 | 0.5 |
| 27 | visitmilwaukee | 69 | 0.1 | 17.8 |
| 28 | VermontTourism | 65 | 0.8 | 3.1 |
| 29 | VisitNH | 58 | 0.6 | 1.9 |
| 30 | travelnevada | 54 | 0.5 | 2.3 |
| 31 | ashevilletravel | 53 | 1.6 | 0.8 |
| 32 | southernoregon | 50 | 0.1 | 9.0 |
| 33 | VisitVirginia | 48 | 0.7 | 1.3 |
| 34 | fargomoorhead | 48 | 1.5 | 1.5 |
| 35 | visitkc | 45 | 0.6 | 2.0 |
| 36 | VisitFlagstaff | 43 | 2.5 | 0.9 |
| 37 | UtahStateParks | 42 | 0.1 | 6.9 |
| 38 | WCVA | 41 | 1.0 | 1.4 |
| 39 | visitfingerlake | 36 | 4.0 | 0.3 |
| 40 | AnnArborAreaCVB | 32 | 0.8 | 0.8 |
| 41 | BattleCreekCVB | 31 | 0.2 | 3.9 |
| 42 | FortSmithCVB | 29 | 1.5 | 0.5 |
| 43 | VisitMissouri | 26 | 0.0 | 3.7 |
| 44 | VaBeachCVB | 25 | 0.1 | 4.9 |
| 45 | PensacolaCVB | 24 | 0.7 | 1.2 |
| 46 | insidealaska | 21 | 2.2 | 0.5 |
| 47 | Hillsborough | 20 | 1.4 | 0.8 |
| 48 | chattanoogafun | 20 | 0.2 | 3.8 |
| 49 | HarborCountry | 20 | 0.1 | 3.3 |
| 50 | VisitJacksonMI | 16 | 0.0 | 10.0 |
And here is a quick look at the growth rates for the three most followed and three fastest growing destinations over the last 3 months.
Most followed:
Fastest growing:
Of course now we all want to know what @paadventure did on December 2nd when they picked up 200 new users in just one day.
And don’t forget: if you work for a tourism organization and have not participated in the “Social Media in Tourism” survey then please click here and give us your thoughts. The survey will close at the end of this week.
January 6th, 2009 at 9:27 am
These are so interesting. I’m very excited to be included in the results and while I’m not thrilled with my current status – this gives me the baseline to springboard from. Good Stuff.
January 6th, 2009 at 11:26 am
Great list. Nice to see a MO CVB (Springfield) on there.
Here at the Missouri Division of Tourism, three communications staff members are active on Twitter (@motravelgirl, @motravelmama, @travelynnmo). We do have @visitmissouri but post much less frequently to that, mainly because we are finding it more genuine, more personal, more community-minded and more enjoyable to build relationships each on our own, based on our individual experiences, interests and personalities.
I am curious how many other DMOs are using Twitter in this way rather than through a general state/region/city Twitter account.
Lynn Pickerel
Missouri Division of Tourism
lynn.pickerel@ded.mo.gov
Twitter: @travelynnmo
January 6th, 2009 at 11:52 am
Wow, it is great to see so many travel destinations engaging in Twitter. It is such a versatile tool that really aides in getting the message out. My name is Mandy McFadden and I am the person behind the scenes with the PAadventure’s Twitter account. I work on behalf of VisitPA for BarkleyREI as a Social Media Specialist.
Since joining Twitter we have actively sought out users that are truly interested in Pennsylvania. This interest could be in our spectacular cities or even particular passions like hiking, biking, shopping and my personal favorite… Dining! We feel that the quality of our followers is far more important than the quantity but in our case it just so happens that there are tons of people who love PA just as much as we do. We conduct twitter outreach (use tweetdeck and twitter search religiously) along with our other social media touch points on a daily basis. This not only helps us gain followers but it starts to build the sense of community. We try to make each follower feel important – no message or reply goes unnoticed. Our hope is that our followers/friends/fans build relationships between each other and keep the momentum and the spirit of Pennsylvania pride alive.
In regards to our actual posts, we like to post just enough each day to keep our followers interested and up to date on the PA happenings but we don’t like to overwhelm them with information. We like to notify everyone when we have new blog posts to talk about, if there is something really cool happening in the travel industry or even something as simple as a travel tip of the day. The combination of these practices, among others, helps us gain the best followers we can ask for, yes, even 200 in one day! Thanks for all your support this past year. We can’t wait to see what 2009 brings!
thanks again,
Mandy @m0remandee
January 6th, 2009 at 9:46 pm
[...] you have any interest how other destinations are having success with Twitter make sure to read a very insightful comment from @paadventure on yesterday’s blog post. Thanks for [...]
January 14th, 2009 at 12:02 am
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January 15th, 2009 at 6:23 am
[...] Fastest growing destinations on Twitter Travel Oregon and Travel Portland are in the top 10. As it should be. [...]
April 18th, 2009 at 4:41 am
Twitter deserves it. It’s certainly the most most useful (for both personal and business use) social media service to arrive in some time.
June 19th, 2009 at 7:28 am
[...] the current state of the industry and use of social media by destination marketing organizations. GoSeeTell Network, Inc. is a Portland, Ore.-based Internet company. The site publishes a monthly ranking of U.S. [...]