Swedes experience limited hours of daylight during winter. November 2014, was the darkest month in Sweden’s recorded history. With night falling after lunch each day in Uppsala, north of Stockholm, children have very little time to play outside.

Light plays a vital role in life, fueling the energy to work, play, create, exercise and interact. It’s especially critical for children, allowing outdoor play that’s essential for cognitive, emotional, physical and social development. More time outside means less time watching television or playing computer-games, leading to better health and fitness, sleep quality and study concentration skills.

In February 2015, Philips illuminated Tegnérparken Playground in Uppsala with its state-of-the-art connected LED lighting system Philips CityTouch. Philips aimed to improve the lives of local children by giving them the opportunity to play outside, even during winter’s darkness.

A social and digital media campaign directly engaged the key audiences, while magnetic content communicated the project progress and fed a dialogue on innovation and light.

Philips lighting program at Tegnérparken Playground has made a night-and-day difference with the primary audience - local children and their families living in Uppsala. Over a two-week period Philips measured physical and well-being metrics from children at a local kindergarten:

• Children spent 37% more time in the park.

• 57 percent of parents reported a noticeable improvement in their children’s mood.

• 43 percent reported a positive impact on their children’s sleeping patterns.

Social and digital media were the key channels used to directly engage with the target audience, through a series of earned, owned and paid media the target audience direct engaged with the branded content and followed the experiment as it played out.

Key social metrics included:

• 144,904 views on YouTube.

• 248,842 impressions on LinkedIn Showcase page.

• 5,746 likes in Instagram.

• 104,768 impressions on Twitter.