Yelp LogoFive years ago I was brought onto Yelp around its inception to brand the company and give it some color. Although risky as an unknown startup, this seemed worth it, so I gave it a shot.

Giving an unknown brand with a unique product was scary and exciting at the same time. I sat in a dinky little conference room showing sketches to developers and the CEO wondering if they thought I was crazy or not.

And so my love of comic strip visuals helped me develop an icon that's part exclamation, part pop. It's the visualization of abstract exclamation. But we called it the Burst and it seems as if it's here to stay. That's cool with me, especially when I see it out in the world.

Guidelines and Brand StandardsThe guidelines are the awesome colorful V8 engine behind Yelp and its Burst. Color and logo standards cracked the whip and kept the Yelp brand in line. These worked pretty well most of the time. I can do this stuff all day.

Yelp.comThen in tandem with the logo and branding, I worked with product managers to deliver this piping hot site to the public, working with wireframes, designing icons and buttons and creating colorful mocks. And it got more challenging as we added more features and switched navigation around.

Eventually the content and design translated into our mobile devices and that just made my whole day when that happened.

Yelp SchwagSchwag or Swag, depending on the nomenclature is the backbone to any good startup. We landed on Yelpstick for the first go-round and it blew up into all kinds of fun tchotchkes from there.

People hung on to this stuff, pinned buttons on their bags, filed their nails, fanned their faces and even put up the 'People Love Us On Yelp' stickers in their windows. Yelp was always with them.

And it made sense, who doesn't like free stuff? And cool free stuff, to boot. But we were always brainstorming the latest, raddest giveaway. From what I hear they still are.

Tote BagsWhat a better way to advertise the site by making people walk all over God's green Earth with the brand slung over their shoulders? Plus the one on the left is 'tote'-ally made from recycled materials. They go like hotcakes at the farmer's market.

Wallet GuidesDon't know what to tip your conceirge?

Done.

Don't know where you are in New York?

There ya' go.

Confused by The Underground in London?

Problem solved.

Creating these cool little wallet guides was a labor of love with all these details in a compact design. Oh, and we partenered with KickMap in the New York version. Nice people.

ButtonsHipsters and girls love pinning these little guys all over everything. I'm a sucker for a button. The'yre kind of cool. I tried to make them as uncorporate as posible (well, minus the logo one) so people would actually pin them on something. Turns out they resulted in a lot, "Oh that's neat, what does it mean?" Which ultimately led to, "Have you heard about Yelp?"

Not a bad cheap way to promote your brand. And safe for kids. Well, sort of.

Elite ShirtsThe Yelp Elite Squad is what powered the Yelp. They are the movers and shakers that write a ton of reviews, hop on the talk boards to contribute to questions and smack down trolls, and, most importantly live and breathe as the site evangelists.

The Elite write really useful, funny and cool reviews to help people find exactly what they were looking for. They are proud to call themselves yelpers, so what better way to let them broadcast that fact with a fun t-shirt?

I wanted to develop something that people wouldn't throw in the drawer or just wear to the gym. It's what I like to call 'corporate funk.'

Patent pending.

Elite LunchboxYelp was all about remarkability in all of the schwag we gave away. So we pushed the Elite giveaway envelope and we decided to develop a retro lunchbox like the kind you had when you were a kid (I had PacMan).

Yelp is unique and fun and that's exactly how we presented the brand.

I did all the illustration and design for this piece.

Oh, and for those of you confused by Yelp 2525, I recommend you check out Zagar & Evan's song "In the Year 2525." Creepy '60s ditty.

NoisePop CD TradeOne of the great ways Yelp got the word out to the community was through trades with our email newsletters or with an event itself.

Noise Pop is a music festival in San Francisco, and we helped promote it through the weekly newsletter and in return I got to design this funky CD graphic on all of their giveaways. I think 10,000 or so were produced and given away at the shows.

People Love Us
On YelpOne of the most successful local business marketing campaigns we pulled off at Yelp. These window clings (which you may have seen) were sent to over 100,000 businesses across the U.S. for spots with great reviews. We let them show off a little Yelp love in their windows.

iPhone App AdsWe also created ads to promote Yelp's products. When the iPhone App was released, we brainstormed and came up with these goofy "Use Yelp Anywhere" banners on the site.

I organized a photoshoot and bootstrapped it by using Yelp employees as models in our shoot.

Good looking crew.

Print AdsAgain, Yelp didn't buy a whole lot of print ad space, but trades were a whole other story. It was a pretty effective system.

Sometimes I would go brand heavy like the ad on the left, but other times I had the opportunity to get creative like the Seattle ad on the right.

Print ain't dead yet.