Ever wanted to build a map without using a real map? I made a quick Tile Map of the United States of America in Tableau. Just beware that not all the countries are easy to recognise when using shapes.

First thing you need an additional data source that you can create or find on the internet in other to have all the different States in a grid. Each State has a row and space value, which will be used after a data blending with the primary data source.

When you drag and drop the Row and Space values into the columns and rows field, you will get something like this.

You can solve this problem in two different ways: either reverse the Row axis, by right clicking on the Axis and selecting Edit Axis.

Or even better by changing both values to Discrete Dimensions.

Drag and drop the State value into Details  and Abbreviations into Label.

Create a very simple calculated field called One and write only 1 into the calculation and then drop the calculation into size.

Choose a Measure value and drop it into the Colours marks. I selected Profit and used a 5 steps colour palette, where red is negative and blue represents positive values.

By selecting the Marks, you can also choose other shapes apart from Rectangles,

or Circles

You can choose a Customised shape, saved as PNG into your Tableau Repository folder in your computer. Click into Shapes and select a shape from the Customised shapes created or from the default ones.

Hope you find this useful, any feedback please write me on Twitter or Linkedin