We match rising creators with brands that share their audience, values and ambition, in a mutually beneficial relationship.
A Creator Discovery and Brand Growth Collective, not a traditional influencer agency.
Spot emerging creators early and connect them with brands, before commercial saturation.
Brands looking for belief, not just reach, and creators ready to be discovered on their own terms.
Johannesburg, South Africa.
Co-founders Tetteh Botchway (creative and brand) and Clement Nkoko (product and experience).
To become Africa's largest creator discovery collective.
People skip ads. Ignore banners. Scroll past celebrity endorsements. They don't want to be advertised to. They want to hear from people they trust. People who feel real, relevant and relatable.
The old model was about buying attention and pushing messages out. The new model is about earning attention and becoming part of the conversation. One interrupts. The other connects. One speaks at people. The other speaks with them.
Trust is highest before commercial saturation. That's when we discover creators while they're still authentic, and connect them with brands before their influence becomes expensive and everyone else catches on.
Become the place where tomorrow's biggest creators are discovered, before the world knows their names.
Make trust-based marketing the default for African brands, measured, repeatable and fresh by design.
Hlanganisa Collective is founded and run by two operators. One comes from creative direction and advertising, the other from product and digital design. Between them the work is made, not outsourced.
Tetteh is a creative director with more than twenty years in advertising, digital marketing and design. His work spans global and local brands including Nike South Africa, Audi, DStv, Vodacom, KFC, South African Tourism and the 2010 World Cup campaign, with recognition at the Loeries, Cannes and D&AD.
At Hlanganisa he leads creative direction, campaign strategy and brand partnerships, shaping how each brand shows up through the creators we discover.
Clement is a product and UX/UI designer with more than twenty years across advertising, art direction and digital product design. He started at Ogilvy Johannesburg, headed digital at Flow Communications and led design at Altivex Studio, then moved into enterprise product work, designing wealth, banking and e-commerce platforms for Standard Bank Group and fintech product experiences at Hyphen Technology.
At Hlanganisa he leads the platform, the creator discovery experience and the brand system, from early discovery through to production ready design.
Hlanganisa Collective is a Creator Discovery and Brand Growth Collective based in Johannesburg, South Africa. It connects brands with emerging creators in a mutually beneficial relationship, rather than paid celebrity endorsements.
Hlanganisa is isiZulu for "to bring together," reflecting the collective's role connecting brands, creators and the communities that already trust them.
It is built as a creator discovery and brand growth collective, not a booking agency. The focus is finding trusted voices before their influence becomes expensive and everyone else catches on, rather than renting reach from names the market has already priced.
People don't trust advertising the way they used to, and increasingly trust the people they already follow instead. Nielsen found 88% of consumers trust recommendations from people they know above any other channel, while average display banner click-through sits near 0.1% (Bannerflow).
It is the shift from a one-way advertising funnel, brand to celebrity to audience, toward a loop where creators keep their voice, brands earn trust, and every purchase feeds the community that started it, rather than a paid push that ends once the ad stops running.
Before a creator's influence becomes expensive and everyone else catches on, while their audience's trust in them is still highest, rather than after the wider market has already noticed them.
Tetteh Botchway, a creative director with more than twenty years across advertising and brand campaigns including Nike South Africa, Audi, DStv, Vodacom and KFC, and Clement Nkoko, a product and UX/UI designer with more than twenty years across advertising, art direction and digital product design, including roles at Ogilvy Johannesburg, Standard Bank Group and Hyphen Technology.
Johannesburg, South Africa.
To become Africa's largest creator discovery collective, and to make trust-based marketing the default approach for African brands.
No. Commercial structure and campaign economics are discussed directly with brand partners. This site covers the brand story and how to get in touch.
Email the founders directly to start a conversation. Contact details are listed below.
We scout emerging creators directly, largely through the content and communities they are already part of, and reach out before their following grows to the point where brand interest changes how they create. Partnership terms are worked out directly with each creator, the same way they are with each brand.
A partnership built around who they already are, brand relationships chosen to fit their audience rather than a generic sponsorship brief, and the chance to be discovered at the moment their audience's trust in them is highest, rather than after it has been diluted by oversaturation.
Whether you are a brand exploring partnerships or a creator we should already know about, this is where the conversation starts. Want the fuller introduction, including how the model works commercially? Ask us, and we will share it directly.