Popfly is building the infrastructure for the creator economy. As the leading platform for adventure creators and brands, we’re where collaboration replaces chaos and authentic partnerships replace transactional campaigns. Brands like Zeal Optics, Camp Chef, and The North Face use Popfly to find vetted creators, co-create content, and track performance that drives real revenue. Creators use us to connect with brands they love, manage their workflow, and get paid.
We’re a fast-scaling startup with proven product-market fit, now racing from thousands to millions of users. Our lean, talented engineering team has built a sophisticated platform powering everything from creator-brand matching to real-time collaboration, payments, and analytics—all purpose-built for the adventure space. We value speed over perfection and pragmatic excellence over complexity. We’re not just building software; we’re building the connected creator ecosystem that defines the future of brand storytelling.
The RoleWe’re looking for a Senior Software Engineer who thrives in the 0→100 phase of a hyper-growth startup. You’ll grow into a technical co-leader—owning domains, architecting scalable systems, and elevating those around you.
This isn’t a typical engineering role. Expect to spend your time:
- 🧩 50% building algorithms & AI features — from creator-brand matching to analytics pipelines
- ⚙️ 25% evolving our platform — scaling architecture, containerization, and future migrations (Heroku → AWS)
- 🧭 25% leading technically — shaping architecture and guiding engineers
- 💡 And another 50% imagining what’s next — prototyping, innovating, and solving problems before anyone else sees them
What You’ll OwnAlgorithms & Intelligence- Own the lifecycle of AI features: problem framing, data sourcing, prototype, offline/online evals, launch, and post-launch iteration.
- Establish evaluation harnesses and dashboards for precision/recall, success rate, and latency.
- Partner with product to set success metrics for matching, recommendations, and creator-brand search quality.
Platform & Infrastructure- Lead our AWS migration from Heroku and architect cost-effective, scalable multi-environment infrastructure
- Containerize our .NET applications using Docker/Kubernetes for better resource management and deployment velocity
- Design and implement horizontal scaling strategies for our API layer as we grow from thousands to millions of requests
- Optimize SQL Server performance and evaluate data architecture decisions
- Own monitoring, observability, and incident response infrastructure
Technical Leadership- Collaborate with the Lead Engineer to guide the team through code reviews, architectural decisions, and quality control
- Make high-leverage decisions: when to extract microservices, when to refactor vs. rebuild, and when “good enough” is actually right
- Champion engineering best practices while understanding startup trade-offs - we ship fast, but we ship with quality
- Bridge between product/design vision and technical execution
Our Stack- Backend: .NET Core, C#, EF Core, MSSQL Server
- Frontend: Next.js, TypeScript, MUI
- Infrastructure: Heroku, Azure, AWS, RabbitMQ
- Key integrations: Shopify, Stripe, Autumn, Algolia, Phyllo, Cloudinary, TalkJS, Liveblocks, Knock, SendGrid, Datadog
- AI: OpenAI/Anthropic, LangChain/LangGraph, pgvector or Weaviate, Python for notebooks and evals
Must-Haves- 4+ years of software engineering experience
- Proficiency in .NET, C#, MSSQL, and React/Next.js
- Strong grasp of algorithms, data structures, and design patterns
- Experience building or integrating AI-driven systems (search, recommendations, ranking, or matching), including hands-on use of LLM tools (OpenAI, Anthropic, LangChain) and vector search workflows (RAG, embeddings)
- Data-driven mindset — comfortable defining metrics, running experiments, and iterating on results
- Solid understanding of DevOps and cloud infrastructure
- Proven technical leadership with architectural and strategic decision-making experience
- Startup mentality — adaptable, fast-moving, and energized by building from 0→1
- You love leveraging AI tools like Cursor to enhance your productivity
Nice-to-Haves- Containerization experience (Docker production; Kubernetes/ES)
- Recsys or marketplace matching experience.
- Feature stores, offline/online evaluation, and feedback loops.
- Familiarity with Pinecone/Weaviate/pgvector, and job/data pipelines (Dagster/Airflow).
- Safety, abuse, and prompt-injection mitigation for user-facing AI features.
What We Offer💰 Competitive salary: $135K–$160K (based on experience, skill, and location)
🚀 Autonomy & ownership: Influence technical direction and the future of our company
🧠 Modern stack: Work with well-supported, forward-looking technologies
🌍 Remote-friendly culture: In-person or hybrid preferred, but output > location
🎯 Impact: Your work directly shapes the experience of thousands of creators and brands
📈 Growth: Join a company scaling at an incredible pace
💪 Flexible health benefits: Customizable healthcare reimbursement to fit your needs
🌴 Generous PTO: Recharge and explore whenever you need it
Our Engineering Culture- Ship with quality, but ship fast - we iterate based on real user feedback
- Consistency compounds - we favor uniform “good enough” patterns
- Fail fast - clear error handling, early returns, structured logging
- Readable over clever - clarity beats complexity
- Test what matters - unit tests for business logic, integration/E2E for critical flows
- See a problem, own the problem - ownership extends beyond titles
Ready to Build Something Extraordinary?If this sounds like you and you’re excited about joining our fast-growing startup, then we want to hear from you!
Apply with:
- Your resume, LinkedIn, and GitHub if applicable
- A brief note explaining one or more of the following:
- Your most impactful technical project in the last 2 years
- Your experience with algorithms/AI and platform/DevOps work
- Why Popfly’s mission and stage excite you
Popfly is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.
https://www.popfly.com/
