Senior Brand Designer

📍 Job Overview

Job Title: Senior Brand Designer

Company: Retell AI

Location: Redwood City, California, United States

Job Type: FULL_TIME

Category: Brand & Marketing Design

Date Posted: 2026-08-13

Experience Level: Mid-Senior Level (2-5 years)

Remote Status: On-site

🚀 Role Summary

• Lead the visual identity and brand expression for Retell AI, a rapidly growing voice AI company, defining how the brand looks across all customer touchpoints.

• Develop and execute compelling visual assets for marketing campaigns, product launches, landing pages, social media, and sales collateral, ensuring brand consistency and impact.

• Translate complex AI concepts into understandable and engaging visual narratives through diagrams, illustrations, and product marketing graphics.

• Establish and extend a comprehensive brand system (typography, color, illustration, templates) to empower other teams to produce on-brand materials efficiently.

• Design physical and experiential brand touchpoints, including event booths, signage, and company merchandise, ensuring a cohesive and desirable brand presence.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role is crucial for Retell AI's growth stage, as the first dedicated senior brand designer. The emphasis is on a designer who can not only execute high-quality work but also define and scale the visual language for a nascent category (voice AI). The role requires a blend of creative vision, rapid execution, and strategic brand system development, aligning with the fast-paced nature of a high-growth startup.

📈 Primary Responsibilities

• Conceptualize and execute high-impact visual assets for all marketing and communication channels, including digital ads, social media content, website elements, and email campaigns.

• Create clear and insightful diagrams, illustrations, and infographics that demystify complex AI technology for diverse audiences, from technical prospects to enterprise clients.

• Develop and maintain a robust brand style guide, including typography, color palettes, iconography, and layout principles, ensuring brand consistency across all internal and external communications.

• Design and manage the visual elements for physical brand experiences, such as trade show booths, event collateral, and company swag, ensuring they reflect the brand's innovative and professional image.

• Collaborate closely with product marketing, sales, and engineering teams to ensure brand messaging and visual representation are aligned with product development and business objectives.

• Drive brand consistency by creating reusable templates and design assets for various departments, enabling efficient content creation while maintaining brand integrity.

• Proactively identify opportunities to elevate the Retell AI brand through innovative design solutions and visual storytelling.

📝 Enhancement Note: The primary responsibilities are framed to highlight the strategic impact of the brand designer, moving beyond mere asset creation to shaping the company's visual narrative and brand system. Emphasis is placed on translating complex technology into accessible visuals and ensuring brand scalability, which are key for a high-growth tech company.

🎓 Skills & Qualifications

Education: While no specific degree is mandated, a strong foundation in visual design principles is expected, often gained through formal education in Graphic Design, Visual Communications, or a related field, or through equivalent practical experience.

Experience: Minimum of 3+ years of dedicated brand or marketing design experience, with a proven track record of creating impactful visual campaigns and assets across various media.

Required Skills:

• Portfolio Excellence: A comprehensive portfolio showcasing a wide range of successful brand work, including web design, social media campaigns, print collateral, and integrated campaign executions.

• Design Fundamentals: Mastery of core design principles, including typography, layout, color theory, and composition, with a keen eye for detail and aesthetic quality.

• Software Proficiency: Expert-level fluency in industry-standard design tools such as Figma and the Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign).

• Rapid Execution: Demonstrated ability to deliver high-quality design assets quickly, moving from a brief to a shipped asset within a matter of days, not weeks.

• Brief Interpretation: Strong capacity to understand and execute design concepts from concise, one-line briefs, proactively bringing creative direction and vision to projects.

Preferred Skills:

• Illustration/3D: Proficient in creating custom illustrations, icons, and 3D graphics to enhance brand visuals and product imagery.

• Motion & Video: Experience with motion graphics and video editing tools like After Effects, Rive, or similar for dynamic social and launch assets.

• Web Design & Development Literacy: Familiarity with web design principles and front-end technologies (HTML/CSS), with experience in platforms like Webflow or Framer, enabling independent page creation.

• AI/Developer Tools Industry Experience: Prior design experience within the AI, developer tools, or SaaS sectors, or a demonstrated understanding of how leading AI brands present themselves visually.

• AI-Assisted Design: Practical experience and prompt-level fluency in using AI image and video generation tools as part of a design production workflow.

📝 Enhancement Note: The "Must have" and "Nice to have" sections are rephrased as "Required Skills" and "Preferred Skills" for clarity. The emphasis on speed and ability to work from a brief is highlighted as a critical requirement for this fast-paced startup environment. The preferred skills are tailored to match the company's focus on AI and modern web technologies.

📊 Process & Systems Portfolio Requirements

Portfolio Essentials:

• Demonstrated Brand Ownership: Showcase examples where you've significantly contributed to or led the visual direction of a brand, illustrating your ability to shape and maintain brand identity.

• Campaign Execution: Include case studies of marketing campaigns from concept to completion, detailing the brief, your design process, creative decisions, and the resulting assets.

• Visual Problem-Solving: Present projects where you translated complex ideas or technical concepts into clear, understandable visuals (e.g., diagrams, infographics, explainer graphics).

• System Extension: Provide examples of how you've extended existing brand guidelines or created new design systems, demonstrating scalability and consistency.

• Multi-Channel Proficiency: Ensure your portfolio covers a range of media, including web, social, print, and experiential design, highlighting adaptability.

Process Documentation:

• Workflow Efficiency: Be prepared to discuss your design process, emphasizing how you manage multiple projects, prioritize tasks, and meet tight deadlines, particularly in a fast-paced environment.

• Collaboration & Feedback: Highlight your approach to receiving and incorporating feedback from stakeholders, demonstrating how you iterate on designs to achieve optimal outcomes.

• Tool Integration: Be ready to explain how you leverage tools like Figma and Adobe Creative Suite in your workflow to maximize efficiency and output quality.

• Brand System Development: If applicable, describe your experience in developing or contributing to design systems, illustrating your understanding of scalable design principles.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section is tailored to a design role, focusing on visual assets, brand systems, and the creative process. The "Portfolio Essentials" emphasize showcasing impact and range, while "Process Documentation" focuses on the candidate's workflow, collaboration, and tool utilization relevant to design execution and brand consistency.

💵 Compensation & Benefits

Salary Range: $190,000 - $240,000 USD per year. This range reflects the company's commitment to attracting top-tier talent ("Top 1% talent") and is benchmarked at the top 5th percentile for comparable roles in the industry, considering the demanding nature of a high-growth startup and the specialized skills required for this Senior Brand Designer position.

Benefits:

• Comprehensive Health Coverage: 100% coverage for medical, dental, and vision insurance for employees.

• Daily Food Stipend: $70/day DoorDash credit for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks, supporting employee well-being and productivity.

• Wellness Reimbursement: $200/month for gym memberships, fitness classes, or other wellness activities.

• Commuter Support: $300/month reimbursement for commuting expenses such as gas and Caltrain, acknowledging the on-site work requirement.

• Connectivity Stipends: $75/month for phone bills and $50/month for internet, ensuring employees have reliable communication and connectivity.

• Equity: Significant equity stake with a 4-year vesting schedule and a 1-year cliff, aligning employee success with company growth.

Working Hours: The standard working hours are approximately 40 hours per week. However, the role may require flexibility and additional hours during peak campaign periods or critical project deadlines, typical for a fast-paced startup environment. The company emphasizes performance and impact over strict adherence to hours.

📝 Enhancement Note: The salary range is explicitly stated and contextualized within the company's compensation philosophy. Benefits are detailed with specific amounts and purposes. The working hours are presented with an acknowledgment of startup demands, and the company's performance-driven approach is highlighted. The salary estimate is based on the provided range and the seniority of the role in a high-cost-of-living area like Redwood City.

🎯 Team & Company Context

🏢 Company Culture

Industry: Voice AI and Enterprise Software. Retell AI operates at the intersection of cutting-edge artificial intelligence and customer experience technology, disrupting traditional call center operations. The company is a leader in agentic AI, building intelligent AI "workers" that enhance and automate customer interactions.

Company Size: Approximately 50 employees, indicating a lean, agile, and fast-paced startup environment. This size allows for high individual impact and direct influence on company direction.

Founded: Retell AI was founded with a vision to reimagine call centers with voice AI. Its rapid growth from $5M to $80M ARR in under a year and a $1.5B valuation highlights its market disruption and successful product-market fit. The company's backing by Y Combinator and leading investors further solidifies its position.

Team Structure:

• Brand Team: This role is the first senior brand designer, suggesting the brand function is either nascent or being significantly scaled. The designer will likely work closely with marketing leadership and potentially other early design hires.

• Cross-functional Collaboration: Expect to collaborate extensively with marketing, product, sales, and engineering teams. The brand designer's work will directly support go-to-market strategies, product positioning, and sales enablement.

• Reporting: The designer will likely report to a Head of Marketing, VP of Marketing, or a similar senior marketing leader.

Methodology:

• Data-Driven Design: While creative, the design approach is expected to be informed by business objectives, customer insights, and performance metrics, particularly for marketing assets.

• Agile Execution: The company operates at high velocity, requiring designers to adapt quickly, iterate rapidly, and ship assets efficiently to meet relentless marketing demands.

• Innovation & First-Principles Thinking: Retell AI emphasizes tackling hard technical problems and reimagining existing paradigms, a mindset that should extend to brand and visual strategy.

Company Website: https://www.retellai.com/

📝 Enhancement Note: This section synthesizes company information to paint a picture of the work environment for a designer. It highlights the high-growth, innovative nature of Retell AI, the significance of this being the first senior brand design hire, and the expected collaborative and fast-paced operational cadence.

📈 Career & Growth Analysis

Operations Career Level: This is a Senior Brand Designer role, signifying a mid-to-late career stage. It's an individual contributor position with significant ownership and strategic influence, particularly as the first dedicated hire in this specialized area. The role demands not just execution but also the ability to define and elevate the brand's visual language.

Reporting Structure: The Senior Brand Designer will likely report to a senior marketing leader (e.g., Head of Marketing, VP of Marketing). This structure provides direct access to strategic marketing initiatives and ensures brand efforts are aligned with business goals.

Operations Impact: The brand designer's work will have a direct and visible impact on Retell AI's market perception, customer acquisition, and overall brand equity. By defining the visual language of voice AI, this role will be instrumental in differentiating Retell AI in a competitive landscape and shaping how millions of users and businesses perceive the company and its innovative technology. The success of launches, campaigns, and customer engagement will be closely tied to the quality and effectiveness of the brand's visual presentation.

Growth Opportunities:

• Brand System Leadership: Opportunity to build and scale Retell AI's entire brand system from the ground up, establishing best practices and setting the visual direction for years to come.

• Category Definition: Play a pivotal role in defining the visual language for the emerging voice AI category, a unique and impactful career opportunity.

• Team Expansion: As the company grows, there's potential to build and lead a design team, moving into a design management or art direction role.

• Skill Specialization: Opportunity to deepen expertise in areas like illustration, motion graphics, or web design through project work and company support for development.

• High Visibility: Work on high-impact projects with direct visibility to executive leadership and millions of users, accelerating career progression and learning.

📝 Enhancement Note: This analysis focuses on the career trajectory and impact specific to a senior design role within a rapidly scaling tech company. It emphasizes the unique opportunity to shape a new category's visual identity and the potential for leadership growth.

🌐 Work Environment

Office Type: The role is based in Redwood City, California, and is designated as "On-site." This suggests a collaborative office environment designed to foster in-person teamwork and spontaneous idea exchange, crucial for a fast-paced startup. Retell AI's commitment to being a "Best Places to Work" implies a positive and supportive physical workspace.

Office Location(s): Redwood City, California. This location is within the San Francisco Bay Area, offering access to a vibrant tech ecosystem. Relocation support is provided, indicating the company's willingness to attract talent from further afield.

Workspace Context:

• Collaborative Hub: Expect an office environment that encourages interaction between teams. The on-site nature facilitates quick feedback loops, brainstorming sessions, and a strong sense of team camaraderie.

• Tools & Technology: While specific office amenities aren't detailed, a high-growth tech company like Retell AI likely provides modern design tools, reliable technology infrastructure, and potentially dedicated creative spaces.

• Team Interaction: The small team size and on-site requirement mean frequent direct interaction with colleagues across marketing, product, and engineering, fostering a cohesive and integrated work culture.

Work Schedule: The role is full-time, with an expected ~40-hour work week. However, given the company's rapid growth and "relentless" marketing calendar, flexibility and a willingness to put in extra hours during critical periods are anticipated. The focus is on output and impact, encouraging efficient work practices.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section interprets the "on-site" requirement and company culture into tangible aspects of the work environment, emphasizing collaboration, the benefits of a physical office for a startup, and the expected work pace.

📄 Application & Portfolio Review Process

Interview Process:

• Stage 1 — Portfolio Review (Async): The initial step involves submitting your portfolio. This is a critical filter where your visual taste, range, and execution quality are assessed against Retell AI's brand needs.

• Stage 2 — Recruiter Screen (15 min): A brief introductory call to assess basic qualifications, motivations, and logistical details (e.g., salary expectations, start date).

• Stage 3 — Hiring Manager Conversation (30 min): A deeper dive into your portfolio. You'll be asked to walk through 2-3 key projects, explaining the brief, your design process, strategic decisions, and critically, what you would do differently in retrospect. This tests your strategic thinking and self-awareness.

• Stage 4 — Design Exercise (45 min): A practical, timed exercise simulating a real Retell AI brief. This assesses your ability to quickly conceptualize and produce relevant design work under pressure.

• Stage 5 — Onsite (2-3 hours): An in-person session in Redwood City. This includes meeting the team, understanding the work environment, and a significant brand vision discussion with the founders. A dedicated 1-hour session will focus on design brainstorm work, likely involving collaborative problem-solving or concept development.

Portfolio Review Tips:

• Curate Strategically: Select 3-5 of your strongest, most relevant projects. Prioritize work that demonstrates brand system thinking, campaign execution, and visual translation of complex ideas.

• Tell a Story: For each project, clearly articulate the problem (brief), your approach (process, tools, decisions), and the outcome (results, impact). Use visuals effectively to support your narrative.

• Highlight Speed & Adaptability: Showcase projects that were completed under tight deadlines or with evolving requirements. Emphasize how you adapted and delivered.

• Demonstrate Brand Sensibility: Ensure your portfolio reflects a strong understanding of brand consistency, visual hierarchy, and aesthetic appeal relevant to a tech/AI company.

• Showcase AI/Tech Relevance (if applicable): If you have experience in AI, developer tools, or similar tech sectors, highlight this. If not, demonstrate how your skills can be applied to this domain.

Challenge Preparation:

• Understand Retell's Brand: Research Retell AI's current website, marketing materials, and any available brand guidelines. Identify their strengths and areas for visual improvement.

• Practice Design Exercises: Rehearse quick concept generation and design tasks. Focus on articulating your thought process clearly and concisely.

• Prepare for Founder Discussion: Think about your vision for branding in the voice AI space and how you would elevate Retell AI's visual identity. Be ready to discuss industry trends and your unique perspective.

• Anticipate "What would you do differently?": Be prepared to critically analyze your past work, demonstrating self-awareness and a continuous improvement mindset.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section provides detailed, actionable advice for navigating Retell AI's specific interview process, including tips tailored to portfolio presentation and design exercise preparation, emphasizing the company's stated evaluation criteria.

🛠 Tools & Technology Stack

Primary Tools:

• Figma: Essential for collaborative design, prototyping, and UI/UX work. Proficiency is expected for rapid iteration and team collaboration.

• Adobe Creative Suite: Critical for advanced image manipulation (Photoshop), vector graphics and illustration (Illustrator), and layout/print design (InDesign).

• Illustration Software: Potentially Adobe Illustrator, Affinity Designer, or Procreate for custom graphics and icons.

• 3D Software (Preferred): Tools like Blender, Cinema 4D, or similar for creating 3D assets if the candidate possesses these skills.

Analytics & Reporting: While not a primary focus for this brand role, understanding how design impacts metrics is beneficial. Familiarity with analytics platforms (e.g., Google Analytics) and A/B testing concepts may be advantageous for optimizing landing pages and campaign assets.

CRM & Automation: Not directly applicable to this design role, but awareness of how marketing automation platforms (e.g., HubSpot, Marketo) utilize design assets can be helpful for campaign integration.

Web & Motion Tools (Preferred):

• Webflow/Framer: For building and iterating on web pages independently.

• After Effects/Rive: For creating motion graphics and animations for social media and marketing content.

• AI Image/Video Tools: Prompt-level fluency with tools like Midjourney, DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, or RunwayML for efficient asset generation and concept exploration.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section details the expected software proficiency, distinguishing between required tools (Figma, Adobe Suite) and preferred tools that would enhance a candidate's application, aligning with the "Nice to have" skills and the company's modern tech stack focus.

👥 Team Culture & Values

Operations Values:

• Taste & Quality: A strong emphasis on high aesthetic standards and the ability to discern and deliver "good" design, not just "almost-good." This is crucial for defining the visual language of a new category.

• Speed & Volume: The capacity to produce a high volume of quality work consistently without sacrificing attention to detail or brand integrity. This reflects the company's relentless pace.

• Clarity of Thinking: The ability to articulate design decisions in terms of business objectives and customer understanding, moving beyond purely aesthetic justifications.

• Ownership & Initiative: Proactively identifying and addressing brand inconsistencies or opportunities for improvement across all touchpoints, taking responsibility for the brand's visual health.

• Collaboration: Working effectively with cross-functional teams to ensure brand alignment and support broader business goals.

Collaboration Style:

• Direct & Iterative: Expect a collaborative style that involves frequent feedback loops, quick iterations, and direct communication with stakeholders, including founders.

• Brief-Driven, Vision-Led: While briefs provide direction, the culture values designers who can bring their own vision and proactively propose creative solutions.

• In-Person Synergy: The on-site requirement fosters a culture of in-person brainstorming, spontaneous problem-solving, and a shared sense of team purpose.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section translates the company's stated evaluation criteria ("HOW WE EVALUATE") and general startup ethos into specific cultural values and collaboration styles relevant to a design role, emphasizing the blend of creative execution and business-mindedness.

⚡ Challenges & Growth Opportunities

Challenges:

• Defining a New Category's Visuals: Voice AI lacks a standardized visual language. The primary challenge is to establish a compelling, clear, and differentiated visual identity for Retell AI that resonates with its target audience.

• High-Volume, High-Velocity Output: The "relentless" marketing calendar and rapid growth demand consistent high-quality output under tight deadlines, testing endurance and efficiency.

• Balancing Brand Consistency with Rapid Iteration: Ensuring brand integrity across numerous assets and campaigns while adapting quickly to new product features or market opportunities.

• Translating Abstract Concepts: The difficulty of visually representing complex AI functionalities and abstract concepts in an easily understandable and engaging manner.

Learning & Development Opportunities:

• Category Leadership: Opportunity to be a foundational voice in shaping the visual identity of the agentic AI and voice AI space.

• Strategic Brand Building: Direct involvement in high-level brand strategy discussions and execution, influencing the company's market perception.

• Cross-Functional Skill Development: Exposure to product marketing, sales enablement, and engineering workflows, broadening understanding of the business.

• Mentorship from Founders: Direct interaction and feedback from founders who are deeply invested in the company's vision and brand.

• Potential for Team Growth: Opportunity to build and lead a design function as the company scales.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section outlines potential challenges inherent in the role and company context, framing them as opportunities for learning and professional growth, particularly in the context of a fast-evolving industry and a high-growth startup.

💡 Interview Preparation

Strategy Questions:

• "How would you approach defining the visual language for a new category like voice AI, where there's no established precedent?" (Tests strategic thinking, category understanding, and vision)

• "Describe a time you had to deliver a high volume of design assets under a tight deadline. What was your process, and how did you maintain quality?" (Assesses speed, efficiency, and execution under pressure)

• "Walk us through a project where you translated a complex technical concept into a clear visual. What were the challenges, and what was the outcome?" (Evaluates ability to simplify complexity and communicate effectively)

• "How do you ensure brand consistency across a wide range of touchpoints, especially when empowering other teams to create assets?" (Probes understanding of brand systems and scalability) Company & Culture Questions:

• "Why Retell AI, and what excites you about our mission in voice AI?" (Assesses motivation and cultural fit)

• "Our evaluation emphasizes 'taste under constraint' and 'volume without decay.' How do you embody these principles in your work?" (Tests alignment with company values and evaluation criteria)

• "Describe a situation where you took ownership of a brand issue or opportunity without being asked. What did you do?" (Gauges initiative and proactive problem-solving)

• "How do you approach receiving and incorporating feedback, especially from non-designers or founders?" (Evaluates collaboration and receptiveness to input) Portfolio Presentation Strategy:

• Select Impactful Projects: Choose 3-4 projects that best showcase your brand-building, campaign execution, and visual problem-solving skills, ideally with some relevance to tech or complex concepts.

• Tell a Concise Story: For each project, clearly articulate the brief/problem, your strategic approach, key decisions, and the measurable impact or outcome. Keep it high-level but data-informed where possible.

• Highlight Speed & Efficiency: If possible, include a project that demonstrates your ability to work quickly and efficiently.

• Be Ready for Deeper Dives: Prepare to discuss specific design choices, challenges encountered, and alternative approaches you considered.

• Showcase Vision: Be prepared to discuss your overall design philosophy and how it aligns with Retell AI's mission and potential brand direction.

📝 Enhancement Note: This section provides specific, tailored questions and preparation advice for the interview process, directly referencing Retell AI's stated evaluation criteria and the unique aspects of the role.

📌 Application Steps

To apply for this Senior Brand Designer position:

• Submit your application through the provided link on Ashby HQ.

• Curate Your Portfolio: Carefully select 3-5 of your most relevant and impactful design projects. Prioritize work that demonstrates strong brand identity development, campaign execution, and the ability to translate complex ideas visually. Ensure your portfolio clearly articulates the brief, your process, and the outcomes.

• Tailor Your Resume: Highlight experience and skills most relevant to brand design, marketing design, and working in fast-paced tech environments. Use keywords such as "brand identity," "campaign design," "visual strategy," "Figma," "Adobe Creative Suite," and any experience with AI or developer tools. Quantify achievements where possible (e.g., "increased engagement by X% through campaign visuals").

• Prepare for Project Walkthroughs: Be ready to discuss your chosen portfolio projects in detail during the hiring manager conversation and onsite interview. Practice articulating your design rationale, creative process, and how you handle feedback and iterate on designs.

• Research Retell AI: Thoroughly understand Retell AI's mission, product, current brand presence, and recent achievements. Think critically about their visual identity and how you would contribute to its evolution. Prepare thoughtful questions for the team and founders.

⚠️ Important Notice: This enhanced job description includes AI-generated insights and industry-standard assumptions. All details, especially regarding specific responsibilities, team dynamics, and interview expectations, should be verified directly with Retell AI during the application and interview process.