Principal Applied Scientist, Advertiser Growth, Amazon Sponsored Products & Brands

Amazon is hiring a Principal Applied Scientist, Advertiser Growth, Amazon Sponsored Products & Brands in Palo Alto, United States. It pays $179k a year and Level rates it ; you can apply on Amazon.

Level's read on this job

Little AI ●○○○ is how Level rates this applied scientist role: aI is not part of the work.
Pay on this posting starts in line with the typical applied scientist posting on Level.
The posting mentions fine tuning and NLP among its tools and skills.
Level classes it as a lead role.
Amazon has 20,000+ other open roles on Level.

AI in this role

fine-tuningnlp

The Sponsored Products and Brands team at Amazon Ads is re-imagining the advertising landscape through industry leading generative AI technologies, revolutionizing how millions of customers discover products and engage with brands across Amazon.com and beyond. We are at the forefront of re-inventing advertising experiences, bridging human creativity with artificial intelligence to transform every aspect of the advertising lifecycle from ad creation and optimization to performance analysis and customer insights. We are a passionate group of innovators dedicated to developing responsible and intelligent AI technologies that balance the needs of advertisers, enhance the shopping experience, and strengthen the marketplace. If you're energized by solving complex challenges and pushing the boundaries of what's possible with AI, join us in shaping the future of advertising.

Key job responsibilities
The Principal Applied Scientist in Advertiser Guidance team will lead 50+ builders in pioneering a new generation of agentic AI applications for Amazon advertisers. You will define and lead the science roadmap of developing agentic experiences for recommendations and guidance delivered to +1.6MM Sponsored Products and Brand advertisers across multiple channels (Ad Console, Sales-managed, and 3P partners).

You will work at the forefront of applied AI, developing methods for fine-tuning, reinforcement learning, and preference optimization, while helping create evaluation frameworks that ensure safety, reliability, and trust at scale. You will work backwards from the needs of advertisers—delivering customer-facing products that directly help them create, optimize, and grow their campaigns.

As a Principal Scientist, you will play a critical role in elevating the team’s scientific and technical rigor, identifying and implementing best-in-class algorithms, methodologies, and infrastructure that enable rapid experimentation and scaling. You will communicate learnings to leadership and mentor and grow Applied AI talent across the Ads Org.

Basic qualifications

- PhD in Computer Science, Statistics or related field.
- 5+ years of applied ML experience in building customer-facing recommender systems involving AI, ML, and NLP.
- Hands-on experience with designing and prototyping AI solutions for real world applications.

Preferred qualifications

- Research publications or patents in generative AI technologies
- Experience with natural language processing and generative model architectures
- Background in advertising technology or e-commerce platforms
- Demonstrated track record of innovative AI solution development

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

Our compensation reflects the cost of labor across several US geographic markets. The base pay for this position ranges from $179,000/year in our lowest geographic market up to $309,400/year in our highest geographic market. Pay is based on a number of factors including market location and may vary depending on job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Amazon is a total compensation company. Dependent on the position offered, equity, sign-on payments, and other forms of compensation may be provided as part of a total compensation package, in addition to a full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits. For more information, please visit https://www.aboutamazon.com/workplace/employee-benefits. This position will remain posted until filled. Applicants should apply via our internal or external career site.

How we rate this

Principal Applied Scientist, Advertiser Growth, Amazon Sponsored Products & Brands at Amazon rates 10 out of 100 for how much of the daily work is AI. That makes it Little AI (AI Level 1 of 4). The level is about AI in the job, not seniority.

Classification

Little AI. AI is not part of the work.

●●●● Builds AI80 to 100
●●●○ Works on AI60 to 79
●●○○ Uses AI40 to 59
●○○○ Little AI0 to 39

Levels come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Read the description and count the AI tools, models and workflows it names.

Key facts

Principal Applied Scientist, Advertiser Growth, Amazon Sponsored Products & Brands is an open job at Amazon.
Level rates this role AI Level 1 of 4: Little AI.
The listed salary is $179k a year.
The role is based in US, CA, Palo Alto.
The job was posted on October 24, 2025.
Seniority: lead.
Applications are handled by Amazon. Apply on Amazon

Prepare for this job

Built from this posting and from similar jobs on Level.

Skills and AI tools this role asks for

Fine-tuningNLP

Also common in applied scientist jobs at this level

Python C++Java AWS Machine learning TensorFlow

Pay

This job starts at: $179k
Typical applied scientist job: $172k

This posting starts close to the typical applied scientist job. See applied scientist jobs

Questions you could be asked

Walk me through fine-tuning a model: what data did you use, and how did you check the result?
What NLP problem have you worked on, and how did you measure whether it actually worked?

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List these exact terms on your resume: Fine-tuning and NLP. An applicant tracking system matches the wording, not the idea.
Attach one line of real, concrete experience to at least one of them. A tool named with nothing behind it rarely survives a human read.

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