Director of Ad Platform Operations

About the role

You will own the end-to-end technical and operational backbone of Duolingo Ads, ensuring campaign delivery quality across direct-sold and programmatic channels. This role demands deep ownership of GAM architecture, QA workflows, and escalation management to uphold reliability and scalability. You will shape how premium demand is packaged and scaled through PMP and PG deals while improving operational excellence. You will act as the primary strategic partner for buyers, platforms, and internal teams to resolve complex delivery issues. Success will be defined by your ability to build a high-accountability operating model and evolve our ads business. You will drive systems, processes, and team development to make Duolingo Ads more predictable and scalable. This is a hands-on leadership role where you will keep the ads engine running smoothly while enabling business growth.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Own Google Ad Manager (GAM) structure and hygiene including canonical ad unit design, yield group logic, order and line-item standards alongside trafficking, QA, and launch workflows with clear SLAs and escalation paths.
• Act as the senior escalation point for complex campaign delivery issues across direct, PMP, and PG deals, working directly with buyers, DSPs, SSPs, and internal teams including monitoring pacing, reconciling 1P/3P reporting discrepancies, and flagging under-delivery risk with recommended fixes.
• Partner with Sales and Account Management on pre-sale feasibility, targeting and tagging requirements, measurement questions, and programmatic deal setup, and build the documentation and training that lets commercial teams sell technical ad products without constant specialist support.
• Accelerate premium programmatic revenue by packaging inventory, configuring always-on and custom PMP/PG deals, and onboarding new SSPs, demand sources, and measurement vendors scaling premium demand without degrading UX or operational quality.
• Identify the critical resources, people, vendor partners, and technology required for ad operations to scale, and drive prioritization across them.
• Define and maintain rigorous QA processes for campaign launches, tag implementations, and trafficking workflows to minimize delivery errors and ensure buyer confidence.
• Collaborate with Engineering and Data to design reporting dashboards, improve data quality, and align metrics across sales, operations, and buyer platforms.
• Develop and maintain standard operating procedures for partner onboarding, issue resolution, and performance reviews to create a scalable support model.
• Work closely with Finance to model revenue impact, pacing, and forecast accuracy based on campaign execution and delivery trends.
• Serve as a bridge between technical and commercial stakeholders, translating operational constraints into actionable requirements and solutions.
• Monitor marketplace dynamics, supply path options, and industry trends to recommend strategic improvements to Duolingo's ad stack.
• Lead cross-functional initiatives to remove operational bottlenecks and automate manual processes in the ad operations lifecycle.
• Track and analyze key performance indicators such as fill rate, eCPM, latency, and error rates to drive continuous optimization.
• Coordinate with Demand Partners and Ad Networks to test new inventory formats and evaluate incremental revenue opportunities.
• Ensure compliance with brand safety and viewability standards across all demand sources and platforms.
• Support the development of a testing framework to validate new integrations before they go live in production.
• Document end-to-end workflows for critical processes to enable smooth transitions and knowledge continuity.
• Act as a subject matter expert during executive reviews, providing data-driven insights and recommendations.

Requirements

• 8+ years in digital advertising, AdOps, or technical advertising solutions, with deep hands-on expertise in Google Ad Manager, trafficking, QA, troubleshooting, pacing, reporting, and campaign delivery across direct and programmatic.
• Experience working directly with buyers, DSPs, SSPs, or publisher-side programmatic teams to resolve technical campaign issues grounded in strong knowledge of programmatic buying, measurement, ad verification, targeting, deal types, and the operational realities of PMP and PG execution.
• A proven ability to build or scale operational systems, including SLA-based support workflows, escalation paths, QA processes, documentation, and ticket-based issue management.
• Experience partnering cross-functionally with Sales, Account Management, Product, Engineering, and Data in a fast-moving environment with evolving products and imperfect systems.
• Sound judgment, strong communication skills, and the ability to stay hands-on in the details while setting strategy and raising the bar for how the function operates.
• Demonstrated experience managing high-stakes relationships with external partners and internal stakeholders under tight deadlines.
• Strong analytical mindset with the ability to interpret large datasets, diagnose root causes, and propose actionable solutions.
• Comfort working in ambiguous situations where processes are not fully defined and priorities shift rapidly.

Nice to have

• Preferred items are not specified for this role.

Practical notes

• This is a full-time position based in New York, NY.
• No specific hours, travel, visa, or deadline information is provided in the source.