Despite billions of dollars spent annually on conservation initiatives, we have very little knowledge on why some initiatives take off and spread around the world, while others languish and disappear. In this talk, Morena will show you the result of new research that conservation initiatives generate robust insights of the patterns of spread and the factors that accelerate the speed and extent to which they are adopted. Morena will highlight some of the amazing stories behind the conservation initiatives that have ‘gone viral’, with rapid, widespread adoption transforming the relationship between people and nature at national or global scales. These insights can help catalyse environmental conservation at scale through new, evidence-based approaches to design and implementation.