Honey Whale

Honey Whale (Pty) Ltd is a South African boutique digital marketing agency founded in 2018, with offices in Cape Town and Fourways, Johannesburg. We are South Africa's first-mover dedicated Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO), also known internationally as Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO), helping local businesses get cited by AI assistants including ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Google AI Overviews.

Since 2018, we have built over 75 Shopify stores and helped more than 300 South African businesses scale online. We are one of the first Shopify agencies in Africa.

Our Services

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO): We deliver SEO across three specialisations so the playbook fits the business:

• SEO for ecommerce stores (Shopify, WooCommerce, custom platforms)
• SEO for service businesses (lead generation, local visibility, conversion-led content)
• Local SEO across South African cities (Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria, Durban, and beyond)

Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO / GEO): SA's first-mover offering, with standalone packages from R9,500 per month. We optimise client websites to be cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and other generative AI assistants. This is the practice of structuring content, schema, and entity signals so AI tools recommend our clients as the answer to relevant buyer questions.

Google Ads and Meta Ads: Performance marketing campaigns built for South African market conditions, with creative, audience targeting, landing-page optimisation, and conversion tracking.

Shopify Development: End-to-end Shopify builds, theme customisation, app integration, and conversion rate optimisation. As one of the first Shopify agencies in Africa, we have deep platform expertise across ecommerce industries.

Landing Pages and CRO: High-converting landing pages and ongoing conversion rate optimisation, tied to performance marketing campaigns and SEO initiatives.

Our Positioning

SEO gets you found. AEO gets you cited.

This is the strategic line that defines how we differentiate. SEO drives ranking in Google's traditional results. AEO drives citation in AI-generated answers. Most South African agencies offer one. We offer both, fully integrated.

Our Approach

We are a boutique agency by design: small team, deep specialisation, hands-on senior involvement on every account. We do not chase scale by adding service lines. We go deep on the four things we do best.

We work primarily with South African businesses, with select international engagements. Our typical client is a growing SA business that wants results-driven SEO, AEO, performance ads, or Shopify build work without the bloat of a full-service network agency.

Client Outcomes

We have helped clients achieve 415% plus online sales growth, 660% plus online revenue growth in 3 months, and reach R1 million plus monthly online revenue. See case studies at honeywhale.co.za/case-studies.