Pope Francis has become quite popular on Twitter. A study reveals that he isamong the list of world leaders with most digital influence. Thats according to Reputation Metrics, which measures public impact. The @Pontifex account has over 8 million followers and during WYD, the account surpassed the 100 tweet mark.
He is considered the most influential leader in social media, because his messages are re-tweeted the most. On average, each tweet is re-tweeted about 22,000 times. That's way more than others on that list, like the account of Venezuela's president Nicolas Maduro.
The account has seen a huge spike in numbers, increasing 161 percent. In March it had 3 million followers. Shortly after the pope's election the account got over 800,000 additional followers in just four days. By the end of July, it had more than 8 million.
The Papal account has its busiest days on Wednesdays, for the general audience and also on Sunday's with the Angelus prayer. On average the Pope writes 5.3 tweets per week.
After World Youth Day in Rio, the number of followers has greatly increased in Portuguese.
As far as content, the key words that have popped out the most in these 100 tweets are God, life and love.
The most common themes are Jesus, love, God's mercy and charity. Pope Francis continues to draw crowds even in the virtual world.
