In an interview with Yelp COO Geoff Donaker, we learned that Yelp reaches over a third of US adults and is closing in on 100 million reviews. But more interesting than that is how the company is facilitating engagement with businesses on the platform, akin to customer relationship management (CRM) tools.

As it relates to Yelp, Geoff talked about how messaging apps in China are becoming all-in-one, ecommerce, “everything” solutions. He isn’t sure that will take hold in US, but he made clear that the company’s core strategy is advertising, particularly search advertising.

But in terms of its CRM resemblance Yelp is offering consumers the following ways to interact (and transact) with local businesses:

• If looking for food delivery, or dinner reservation, Yelp integrates a “book now” button among other integrated commerce capabilities
• Yelp got into transactions in a more meaningful way because it is better for users Geoff said. He added that Yelp had integrated commerce in different forms early on with Orbitz and OpenTable and users liked it.
• A newer tool Yelp now offers is a request for quote for home service providers which allows user to request a quote to multiple businesses in single click.
• There are also a variety of messaging tools built into the platform as well.

Geoff said that Yelp currently has about 2,000 sales people with about 100,000 paying advertisers and two million claimed business profiles. As to what the company looks for in its sales team, Geoff said Yelp seeks good communications skills, persistence. He said the sales position is an entry-level job with an opportunity to move up into management positions.