Machine Learning Scientist III - Ads Science

Wayfair; Seattle (WA); Hybrid; USD 194,000 - 206,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Paid Holidays

PTO

Medical Benefits

Dental Benefits

Vision Benefits

HSA/FSA

Life Insurance

Disability Insurance

Gym discounts

Mental Health Support

Tuition Reimbursement

401K Matching

Employee Discount

Hybrid work model

Job summary

Wayfair in Seattle, WA is seeking an experienced Machine Learning Scientist III to join the Advertising Demand Science team. You will develop intelligent agentic systems and ML capabilities to support our ads revenue and deliver high-impact recommendations.

The role requires strong Python, ML frameworks, and cloud experience, with collaboration across product and engineering to design experiments and translate data into actionable insights for customers.

Qualifications

• PhD with 2+ years experience, or MS with 4+ years, or BS with 6+ years in a quantitative STEM field.
• 2+ years of experience developing, evaluating, optimizing and deploying machine learning models, focusing on advertising, bidding, recommendations, ranking, or personalization.
• Strong understanding of agentic systems and ML for large-scale problems.
• Proficiency in Python and ML frameworks (TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-Learn).
• Experience with data processing and ML pipelines (Airflow, Kubeflow, MLflow).
• Strong coding skills and cloud experience (AWS, GCP, Azure).
• Excellent communication to explain complex ML concepts to non-technical stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical leadership in agentic ML systems to support Ads campaigns and optimizations.
• Design, build, deploy, and refine large-scale ML platforms for ads experiences.
• Collaborate with commercial stakeholders to define business problems and ML solutions.
• Work with engineering, infrastructure, and ML platform teams to promote best practices.
• Identify opportunities from data and assess ROI of changes.
• Research new ad tech developments and integrate them into internal tools.
• Maintain a customer-centric approach in problem framing and execution.

Skills

Python

TensorFlow

PyTorch

Scikit-Learn

AWS

GCP

Airflow

Kubeflow

ML pipelines

A/B testing

Communication

Education

PhD

MS

BS

Tools

Airflow

Kubeflow

MLflow

Job description

• Parental Leave
• Unique Perks:

Salary Range: $194,040 - $206,168 per year. Individual compensation is determined by skills, qualifications, experience, and location. Compensation details listed in this posting reflect the annual base salary only and do not include equity.

Who We Are

Wayfair’s Advertising business is rapidly expanding, adding hundreds of millions of dollars in profits to Wayfair. We build Sponsored Products, Display & Video Ad offerings that cater to a variety of Advertiser goals while showing highly relevant and engaging Ads to millions of customers. We are evolving our Ads Platform to empower advertisers across all sophistication levels to grow their business on Wayfair at a strong, positive ROI and are leveraging state of the art Machine Learning techniques.

The Advertising Demand Science team is central to this effort. We leverage machine learning and generative AI to streamline campaign workflows, delivering impactful recommendations on budget allocation, target Return on Ad Spend (tROAS), and SKU selection. We explore the economics of our advertising system to understand impacts of advertisers’ changes to their outcomes. Additionally, we are developing intelligent systems for creative optimization and exploring agentic frameworks to further simplify and enhance advertiser interactions.

We are looking for an experienced Machine Learning Scientist III to join the Advertising Demand Science team. In this role, you will be responsible for the development of intelligent agentic systems and other machine learning capabilities supporting our ads business. You will work closely with other scientists, as well as members of our internal Product and Engineering teams, to apply your engineering and machine learning skills to solve some of our most impactful and intellectually challenging problems to directly impact Wayfair’s revenue.

What you’ll do

• Provide technical leadership in the development of agentic systems by advancing the state-of-the-art in machine learning techniques to support recommendations for Ads campaigns and other optimizations.
• Design, build, deploy and refine extensible, reusable, large-scale, and real-world platforms that optimize our ads experience.
• Work cross-functionally with commercial stakeholders to understand business problems or opportunities and develop appropriately scoped machine learning solutions
• Collaborate closely with various engineering, infrastructure, and machine learning platform teams to ensure adoption of best-practices in how we build and deploy scalable machine learning services
• Identify new opportunities and insights from the data (where can the models be improved? What is the projected ROI of a proposed modification?)
• Research new developments in advertising, sort and recommendations research and open-source packages, and incorporate them into our internal packages and systems.
• Be obsessed with the customer and maintain a customer-centric lens in how we frame, approach, and ultimately solve every problem we work on.

Who you are

• Minimum 2+ years of experience with PhD, or 4+ years of industry experience with MS, or 6+ years of experience with a BS in a quantitative STEM field.
• 2+ years of experience developing, evaluating, optimizing and deploying machine learning models, with a focus on advertising, bidding, recommendations, ranking, or personalization.
• Strong theoretical understanding of agentic systems and machine learning applied to large-scale ML problems.
• Proficiency in Python and experience with ML frameworks such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, or Scikit-Learn.
• Familiarity with data processing and ML pipeline orchestration (Airflow, Kubeflow, MLflow).
• Strong coding skills and familiarity with building scalable ML systems in cloud environments (AWS, GCP, Azure).
• Ability to work with others to help design experiments and analyze results using A/B testing and statistical techniques.
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to explain complex ML concepts to non-technical stakeholders and drive data-driven decisions.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with Machine Learning platforms offered by Google Cloud and how to implement them on a large scale (e.g. BigQuery, GCS, Dataproc, AI Notebooks).
• Experience in advertising
• Experience in Economics problems common in e-commerce
• Hands-on Agentic experience with chat-based products deployed to consumers

Why You’ll Love Wayfair

• Time Off:
  • Paid Holidays
  • Paid Time Off (PTO)
• Health & Wellness:
  • Full Health Benefits (Medical, Dental, Vision, HSA/FSA)
  • Life Insurance
  • Disability Protection (Short Term & Long Term Disability)
  • Global Wellbeing: Gym/Fitness discounts (including US Peloton, Global ClassPass, and various regional gym memberships)
  • Mental Health Support (Global Mental Health, Global Wayhealthy Recordings)
  • Caregiver Services
• Financial Growth & Security:
  • 401K Matching (Employee Matching Program)
  • Tuition Reimbursement
  • Financial Health Education (Knowledge of Financial Education - KOFE)
  • Tax Advantaged Accounts
• Family Support:
  • Family Planning Support
  • Parental Leave
  • Global Surrogacy & Adoption Policy
• Professional Development & Recognition:
  • Rewards & Recognition
  • Global Employee Anniversary Awards
  • Paid Volunteer Work
• Unique Perks:
  • Employee Discount
  • U.S. Bluebikes Membership
  • Global Pod Outings
• Work/Life Balance:
  • Emphasizing a supportive & flexible work environment that encourages a balance between personal and professional commitments

If you don’t meet every qualification listed, we still encourage you to apply. We’re looking for strong team players who can learn, grow, and make an impact.

This is a hybrid position located in Seattle, WA. The team is in-office Tuesday-Thursday and remote on Monday and Friday.

Assistance For Individuals With Disabilities

Wayfair is fully committed to providing equal opportunities for all individuals, including individuals with disabilities. As part of this commitment, Wayfair will make reasonable accommodations to the known physical or mental limitations of qualified individuals with disabilities, unless doing so would impose an undue hardship on business operations. If you require a reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, please let us know by completing our Accomodations for Applicants form.

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About Wayfair Inc.

Wayfair is one of the world’s largest online destinations for the home. Whether you work in our global headquarters in Boston, or in our warehouses or offices throughout the world, we’re reinventing the way people shop for their homes. Through our commitment to industry-leading technology and creative problem-solving, we are confident that Wayfair will be home to the most rewarding work of your career. If you’re looking for rapid growth, constant learning, and dynamic challenges, then you’ll find that amazing career opportunities are knocking.

No matter who you are, Wayfair is a place you can call home. We’re a community of innovators, risk-takers, and trailblazers who celebrate our differences, and know that our unique perspectives make us stronger, smarter, and well-positioned for success. We value and rely on the collective voices of our employees, customers, community, and suppliers to help guide us as we build a better Wayfair – and world – for all. Every voice, every perspective matters. That’s why we’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship status, marital status, disability, gender identity, gender expression, veteran status, genetic information, or any other legally protected characteristic.

Your personal data is processed in accordance with our Candidate Privacy Notice (https://www.wayfair.com/careers/privacy). If you have any questions or wish to exercise your rights under applicable privacy and data protection laws, please contact us at [e-mail].

The above base pay range may vary depending on location, job-related knowledge, skills and experience. For internal candidates, compensation determinations will be made based on your current position / level, your location, and the new position according to Wayfair's internal mobility policy. As you move through the internal interview process, your recruiter will be able to provide additional details regarding your specific compensation. Please note, the terms of internal offers, including the salary offered, are not negotiable.