Conservation success is contingent on assessing a wide range of social factors so that cost-effective implementation of strategies can be placed in a broad social-ecological context. Until now, the focus has been on how to include social data in conservation planning, while assessing the value of different kinds of social data has received limited attention. Conservation success is contingent on assessing a wide range of social factors so that cost-effective implementation of strategies can be placed in a broad social-ecological context. Until now, the focus has been on how to include social data in conservation planning, while assessing the value of different kinds of social data has received limited attention. Integrating social values and development preferences generated prioritizations that were 1.2% to 51% different compared with those based on biological data alone. Inclusion of conservation preference data made the smallest changes and incorporating all social data to seek to maximize opportunities and minimize conservation costs produced the greatest changes in priority locations. The approach presented here can help conservation planners assess which kind of social data to collect when resources are limited.

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