Today even Google Maps has stayed away from the Hidden City’s streets, there is no Street View available for hat part of the city.

As with so many of the marginalized shanty towns of Latin America, Rife social inequality and lack of employment opportunities creates divisions in such crowded communities, where disadvantaged people and particularly children, are stopped from reaching their full potential.

LG, the 4th Smartphone producer in Argentina wanted to effect social change, take a public stand on a social issue in Buenos Aires, to leverage their technology, their network and assets to bring awareness to The Hidden City, or Villa 15, one of the largest shantytowns in Buenos Aires.

In lieu of the 1978 World Cup being hosted in BA, the government created a barrier around Villa 15 to prevent the press and visitors to see this “unsightly” part of the city. Ciudad Oculta or Hidden City had been born.

Fortunately, there is one NGO that´s trying to change this cycle of poverty and give their own time and knowledge to help people to succeed. Fundación PH15, offer workshops and activities aimed at promoting social integration and the socialization of artistic experiences in children and youth. The most important aspect of his project is the fact that he not only gives children the opportunity to study photography.

LG, one of the top 4 smartphone producers in Argentina, decided to open this hidden world and help PH15 in its mission, and ultimately show that people have more than they think in common with the inhabitants of the Villa 15.

LG joined forces with PH15 by giving them 10 cellphones with state-of-the art cameras, to reveal what life is really like where they live. They would give neighborhoods kids smartphones to allow them to capture their life in Ciudad Oculta, but at the same time, allowing them to express themselves, to find their voice.

The content produced by the children would be exposed on major billboards and other hotspots across the city, the initiative would become an outdoor campaign supporting PH15 and the neighborhood kids.

We started by creating a short video that showed that people in Villa 15 are just like any other person living in Buenos Aires and we promoted it on the brand’s social channels: FB, TW, TY, Instagram. We also developed a dedicated Website where all the pictures would be uploaded and where people could find information about the Hidden City, stats, hard facts and of course, the pictures that where being taken by the children.

We then negotiated the donation of space with Media owners, these allowed us to use major billboards to expose the children’s pictures, taking the initiative all over Buenos Aires with a OOH style campaign. We reached an agreement with Getty Images so that the children’s pictures could be uploaded on to their stock photo base.

Our paid media campaign resulted in more than 50 million impressions.

We reached more than 6 million people digitally.

We garnered more than a million video reproductions.

The video CPV was as low as $0,09 cents ARS, which is 40% lower than industry standards. Our online video campaign had great success, our reach was greater than other campaigns with the same branding objective and budget.

The people´s response was positive and showed interest in the campaign, with more than 600 hundred thousand interactions across all platforms and more than 70% of positive comments.

Earned media generated from negotiations and interest in the campaign, resulted in more than 3.5 thousand ooh donated space and press coverage.

We succeeded in opening The Hidden City to Argentinians all the while allowing the children express themselves, we gave them a voice.