Creative Director - Copywriter

Publicis Groupe Africa Pty Ltd; Johannesburg; On-site; ZAR 900,000 - 1,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Publicis Groupe Africa is seeking a Creative Director — Copywriter, a senior creative leader who translates ambitious client partnerships into distinctive storytelling across campaigns and platforms. You will guide concept development, messaging and tone while mentoring multi-disciplinary teams and ensuring digital-first, AI-aware approaches.

You will work with Strategy, Data and Technology to deliver integrated solutions, shaping culture, learning and the client’s brand narrative across film,

Qualifications

• Must have 10+ years’ experience.
• Demonstrate exceptional strategic thinking.
• Must have led TTL campaigns and digital campaigns (TTL + digital).
• Demonstrate understanding of digital platforms.
• Track record of winning international and local awards (Cannes/Loeries/Clio etc.).
• Show at least 1 international and 1 local gold medal.
• Demonstrate how you’ve previously dealt with conflict.
• Be comfortable with AI being part of everyday activities.
• Demonstrate leadership and problem-solving abilities.
• Show strong presentation skills.

Responsibilities

• Lead concept development, messaging and narrative direction across major campaigns, brand platforms and digital experiences.
• Mentor copywriters and broader creative teams; protect core ideas and tone.
• Partner with Strategy, Data and Technology to deliver integrated solutions across channels.
• Drive production excellence and ensure campaigns have clear ideas and strong writing craft.
• Oversee consistent tone, storytelling and brand voice across long-form and short-form content.

Skills

10+ years experience

Conceptual thinking

Strategic thinking

TTL campaigns

Digital platforms

Awards track record

AI familiarity

Conflict resolution

Team leadership

Public speaking

Tools

Keynote

PowerPoint

Microsoft Word

ChatGPT/Claude AI

Job description

Company Description

Publicis Groupe Africa is a leading marketing, communications, and business transformation network operating across 36 African countries, combining creativity, technology, and local insight to deliver integrated client solutions.

Company Description

Publicis Groupe Africa is a leading marketing, communications, and business transformation network operating across 36 African countries, combining creativity, technology, and local insight to deliver integrated client solutions. Publicis Groupe Africa is part of Publicis Groupe, the second-largest communications group globally, founded in 1926. The African network operates as a partnership of 44 communications agencies with offices spanning 36 countries, including South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, Morocco, and many others Its headquarters are in Johannesburg and Cape Town, providing a central hub for continental operations. Telecommunications is one of the most dynamic categories in the market that sits at the intersection of technology, culture, connectivity, customer experience and everyday life. This role offers the opportunity to work with a leading telecommunications client and help shape the next generation of its agency partnership. We are building a connected, future-fit model that brings together creativity, intelligence, data, technology, AI and world-class execution around the customer. It is an opportunity for ambitious creative talent to influence the work, the ways of working and the capabilities we build — creating a partnership designed not only for today's challenges, but for what comes next.

Overview

The Creative Director — Copywriter is a senior creative leader responsible for translating the creative ambition of the Publicis/client partnership into distinctive, effective and culturally relevant ideas and storytelling. The role leads conceptual development, messaging, tone of voice and narrative craft across major briefs, campaigns, platforms and experiences, while guiding and mentoring multi-disciplinary creative teams. A critical part of the mandate is to combine strong writing and conceptual craft with digital-first thinking, culture, technology, AI and new content models, ensuring ideas can live coherently across channels and customer journeys. The role is accountable for conceptual strength, verbal craft, integrated execution, creative team leadership and client confidence.

Responsibilities

CREATIVE LEADERSHIP & DIRECTION

• Help set and uphold the creative standard for the client/Publicis partnership, working closely with the Executive Creative Director.
• Lead concept development, messaging and narrative direction across major integrated campaigns, brand platforms, digital experiences and content ecosystems.
• Provide clear, constructive direction to creative teams and protect the core idea and tone through execution and rollout.
• Lead brainstorms and creative workshops, creating the conditions for ambitious ideas to be challenged, improved and delivered.
• Remain deeply connected to South African culture, language, consumer behaviour, media and global creative trends.

SENIOR CLIENT & BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP

• Build trusted creative relationships with client stakeholders and confidently present and sell creative thinking.
• Understand the client's business, brand, customers and growth priorities sufficiently to interrogate briefs and identify creative opportunities.
• Translate creative choices into clear business and customer rationale.
• Respond constructively to client feedback while protecting the integrity and ambition of the creative product.

CREATIVE PRODUCT EXCELLENCE

• Drive platform-neutral conceptual thinking with a strong focus on copy, storytelling, tone of voice and idea articulation.
• Define and protect campaign narratives, messaging hierarchies and verbal identity.
• Ensure every major piece of work has a clear idea, strong strategic foundation and appropriate level of writing craft.
• Create across film, radio/audio, social, digital, content, experience, retail, CRM and emerging formats.
• Develop compelling presentations, scripts, headlines, manifestos and idea narratives that make the work easy to understand and buy.
• Use audience, performance and cultural learning to strengthen future creative output.

INTEGRATION & POWER OF ONE CREATIVE LEADERSHIP

• Work seamlessly with Art Direction, Strategy, Media, Data, Technology, Experience, Production, PR and Activation to create genuinely integrated solutions.
• Ensure integrated thinking happens at the start of the process rather than being assembled after ideas are developed.
• Build ideas that travel coherently across channels while adapting tone and format to platform behaviour.
• Help remove discipline and agency silos that limit the quality or effectiveness of the work.

AI, TECHNOLOGY & FUTURE-FIT CREATIVITY

• Champion responsible use of AI in ideation, research, writing exploration, prototyping, content variation and optimisation.
• Use generative AI to increase exploration, speed and personalisation without compromising originality, brand voice or human judgement.
• Develop practical prompting fluency and maintain awareness of emerging creative technologies and content platforms.
• Partner with Strategy, Data and Technology to explore dynamic content, personalisation and new customer experiences.
• Maintain appropriate standards around brand safety, intellectual property, governance and human oversight.

CULTURE, INNOVATION & CREATIVE TRANSFORMATION

• Be a champion for innovation on every project.
• Challenge legacy creative processes and encourage faster, more iterative and connected ways of developing ideas.
• Explore new formats, partnerships and production approaches that improve customer and client value.
• Demonstrate thought leadership by keeping current on culture, language, platforms and industry trends.

STRATEGY & EFFECTIVENESS PARTNERSHIP

• Partner closely with Strategy to interrogate briefs, sharpen propositions and ensure ideas are grounded in meaningful human insight.
• Participate actively in campaign planning and key workshops.
• Work with Strategy and Media to define channel roles and optimise work in market where appropriate.
• Ensure creative and strategic teams operate as one problem-solving unit.

TALENT & TEAM LEADERSHIP

• Manage, mentor and develop copywriters and broader creative teams.
• Help creatives become stronger conceptual thinkers, writers, presenters and problem-solvers.
• Delegate effectively while remaining close enough to the work to protect quality and consistency.
• Support a collaborative, inclusive and ambitious creative culture.

PRODUCTION, CRAFT & EXECUTIONAL EXCELLENCE

• Partner closely with Production and Operations to ensure creative ambition is translated into excellent execution.
• Provide senior copy oversight through production, recordings, shoots, post-production, adaptation and rollout.
• Protect tone, messaging and storytelling consistency across high-volume content and adaptation.
• Balance craft, timing and commercial realities without lowering the creative standard.

Qualifications

• Must have 10+ years’ experience
• Highly conceptual individual (Must demonstrate with at least 5 projects)
• Demonstrate exceptional strategic thinking (Provide 3 examples)
• Must have led the conceptualisation and execution of TTL campaigns and pure digital campaigns (Show minimum of 4 examples)
• Must demonstrate an understanding of digital platforms
• Track record of winning international and local awards i.e. Cannes, One Show, Loeries, Clios, Bookmarks etc.
• Show at least 1 international and 1 local gold medals
• Demonstrate how you’ve previously dealt with conflict
• In-depth working knowledge of existing and emerging technologies & platforms (advantageous)
• Be comfortable with AI being a part of the everyday activities of the role.

BUSINESS KPI’S

• Must demonstrate examples of leadership skills & problem solving
• A strong understanding of best practice interaction and visual design principles
• Must be able to oversee 7-8 projects
• Have the ability to attend every review on a project with 3 new ideas
• Oversee projects and manage and grow the team through the process

THE PERSON

• Good understanding of influencer, Mobile, Podcast, digital, social, out-of-home, guerrilla, activations and direct marketing
• Great time management
• Demonstrate ability to work under immense pressure & meet tight deadlines
• Adept problem-solving skills
• Strong communication skills with ability to provide rationales for creative choices made
• Strong presentation skills
• Able to work with team members & delegate effectively
• Understand the client’s business requirements, and understand how our services should be applied to solve business problems
• Sell an idea or campaign internally and externally

WORKING KNOWLEDGE OF THESE TOOLS

• Keynote / PowerPoint
• Microsoft Word
• ChatGPT, Claude AI and similar generative AI tools
• Strong understanding of AI prompting and responsible AI-assisted writing workflows

Additional Information

Publicis Groupe Africa is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits any forms of Discrimination or Harassment. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all our employees in line with our Employment Equity Plan. All appointments will be based on qualifications, experience and best fit but preference will be given to candidates from designated groups.