Lead Data Scientist, AdTech

WHO ARE WE?

Launch Potato is a profitable digital media company reaching over 30M+ monthly visitors through brands like FinanceBuzz, All About Cookies, and OnlyInYourState. Our mission is to connect consumers with leading brands through data-driven content and technology. Based in South Florida with a remote-first team globally, we foster a high-growth, high-performance culture where speed, ownership, and measurable impact drive success.

WHY JOIN US?

At Launch Potato, you'll accelerate your career by owning outcomes, moving fast, and driving impact with a global team of high-performers. Base salary ranges from $175,000 to $200,000 annually, paid semi-monthly. Must have proven experience in digital marketing, performance marketing, or leadgen, with strong modeling fundamentals and hands-on experience in AWS cloud and various ML techniques.

MUST HAVE

• Proven experience in digital marketing, performance marketing, or the leadgen industry
• Building adtech algorithms and supporting user acquisition or paid media modeling (highly desired)
• Strong modeling fundamentals: building effective models that drive business impact
• Multi-year, hands-on experience building and deploying ML solutions in the AWS cloud
• Hands-on experience across core technique areas: multi-armed bandit / reinforcement learning, recommendation and ranking systems, funnel and monetization optimization, LTV modeling
• Expert Python and SQL experience: 5+ years in a hands-on, in-the-weeds applied data science role delivering measurable business impact

YOUR ROLE

Own the full data science engine for a priority vertical, from business problem to deployed model to live ROAS performance, driving measurable revenue and media efficiency. Hands-on, in-the-weeds role: framing the business problem directly with stakeholders, building and validating the model, handing the ML-engineering last mile to your ML engineering partner, and staying engaged through deployment, monitoring, and performance analysis. Focus on Insurance and Advertiser Quality initially, with scope expanding over time. Primary metric is ROAS.

OUTCOMES

• Own the Insurance vertical's primary modeling work end-to-end with measurable ROAS impact
• Deliver buying models that maintain positive ROAS and quality
• Drive lead quality improvements across brands: Messaging, Funnels, Content/Listicles, and more, resulting in measurable impact to revenue growth
• Establish trusted, direct partnership with vertical business stakeholders
• Produce trusted output: validated, documented, low correction burden
• Identify and leverage net-new modeling opportunities the business has not flagged

COMPETENCIES

• Business-first framing: starts with the problem and the metric, not the model
• Full-stack ownership: stays engaged from problem definition through deployed performance
• Proactive communication: closes loops without being chased
• Collaborative: leans on ML engineering for the last mile rather than working solo
• Coachable: seeks feedback and turns it into visible behavior change
• Curiosity paired with delivery discipline

NICE TO HAVES

• Sophisticated ML at companies where paid digital media is core to the business model
• Creative embeddings work: incorporating embeddings of creatives, videos, headlines, and search into paid media models
• Insurance domain experience
• Creating state-of-the-art Ad Ranking algorithms
• Modeling against ad-platform data points (Google, Meta, native)
• LLMs / deep learning applied to personalization or content
• Familiarity with Looker

COMPENSATION

Total compensation includes a base salary, profit-sharing bonus, and competitive benefits. Base salary is set according to market rates for the nearest major metro and varies based on Launch Potato’s Levels Framework. Future increases will be based on company and personal performance, not annual cost of living adjustments.