Role Description

As a Staff Backend Engineer, you will be a highly technical individual contributor responsible for designing, building, and optimizing the backend systems that power our low-latency ad platform. You will take the lead in developing scalable microservices and streaming data infrastructure to handle high-throughput workloads with minimal latency. This role requires deep expertise in distributed systems and real-time data processing (ideally in the programmatic advertising domain) to ensure our systems remain highly performant and reliable. You’ll work closely with product managers, data scientists, and other engineering teams to translate business needs into technical solutions and ensure the platform is fast, fault-tolerant, and observable.

This role is based in the United States and can be performed remotely, with a preference for candidates who can join us in a hybrid capacity in San Francisco, New York, or Atlanta.

Responsibilities

• System Architecture & Development: Lead the design and implementation of scalable, high-performance backend services, including microservices and APIs, that can efficiently handle large volumes of requests with low latency.
• Streaming Data Infrastructure: Develop and maintain streaming data pipelines and event-driven systems to process and analyze continuous data flows in real time (e.g., using Apache Kafka).
• Performance & Reliability: Ensure the backend systems are highly performant, resilient, and stable under heavy load.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Work closely with cross-functional teams – including Product, Data Science, DevOps, and Frontend – to translate business requirements into scalable technical solutions.
• Technical Leadership & Mentorship: Provide technical leadership within the engineering team without direct managerial duties.
• Technical Strategy & Innovation: Stay abreast of emerging technologies and industry trends and evaluate their potential benefit to our platform.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of software engineering experience building backend systems, with 3+ years in a senior or lead role (e.g. Staff Engineer, Principal Engineer) in the AdTech or a similar high-volume, low-latency domain.
• Proven track record in designing and building high-throughput, low-latency distributed systems that operate at scale.
• Expertise in microservices architecture and distributed system design.
• Proficiency in Java and Go for backend development, and experience with Python for scripting, automation, or data processing tasks.
• Hands-on experience with streaming data technologies and event-driven frameworks, such as Apache Kafka (or AWS Kinesis).
• Strong experience with cloud platforms (AWS preferred) and deploying services in a cloud-native environment.
• Experience with both SQL and NoSQL databases for high-volume applications.
• Familiarity with containerization and orchestration tools (Docker, Kubernetes) and CI/CD pipelines.
• Deep understanding of system observability and monitoring.
• Excellent problem-solving and communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Domain Expertise: Deep knowledge of the programmatic advertising ecosystem.
• High-Scale Data Processing: Experience designing systems that operate at extreme scale.
• Data Pipelines & Analytics: Familiarity with big data processing and analytics pipelines.
• Advanced Performance Tuning: Demonstrated experience in performance profiling and optimization.
• Leadership in the Tech Community: A track record of contributing to open-source projects, technical publications, or speaking at industry conferences.
• Education: Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field (Master’s or Ph.D. a plus).

Company Description

Zeta Global is a NYSE listed data-powered marketing technology company with a heritage of innovation and industry leadership. Founded in 2007 by entrepreneur David A. Steinberg and John Sculley, former CEO of Apple Inc and Pepsi-Cola, the Company combines the industry’s 3rd largest proprietary data set (2.4B+ identities) with Artificial Intelligence to unlock consumer intent, personalize experiences and help our clients drive business growth.

Our technology runs on the Zeta Marketing Platform, which powers ‘end to end’ marketing programs for some of the world’s leading brands.

Zeta Global is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, gender, ancestry, color, religion, sex, age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, medical condition, disability, veterans status, or any other basis protected by law.