AI & ML Engineer

Location: Charleston, SC (Mount Pleasant)

Type: Full-Time

Reports To: CTO / Head of Engineering

About Topline

Topline is the AI growth platform for high-trust service companies. We combine the speed of AI-native agents with the judgment of vetted human experts to help professional service firms—legal, consulting, healthcare, finance—grow without sacrificing their reputation.

We're not building another spam cannon. We're building a system where AI does the grunt work and humans protect what matters: trust, relationships, and outcomes. Our platform replaces 5-7 scattered tools with one unified system, and our pay-for-performance model means clients only pay when we deliver real results.

We're a venture-backed startup at an inflection point: product-market fit is proven, we're cash-flow positive, and now we're scaling. If you want to build AI that actually ships value—not demos—this is the role.

The Role

We're looking for an AI/ML Engineer to own and evolve the intelligence layer powering Topline's four AI agents:

Front Desk Agent — Handles inbound requests, answers questions, routes signals

Outreach Agent — Personalizes prospecting, adapts to engagement signals, knows when to hand off to humans

Marketing Agent — Plans and optimizes campaigns using historical performance and live data

Insights Agent — Translates raw data into forecasts and recommendations in plain language

You'll work at the intersection of applied ML, LLM orchestration, and production systems. This isn't research for research's sake—it's building AI that runs 24/7 for paying customers who judge us by outcomes.

What You'll Do

Build and improve AI agents that handle real customer workflows—outreach personalization, lead scoring, intent detection, conversation routing

Design and implement LLM pipelines including prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and multi-step reasoning chains

Develop our proprietary scoring models (like Topline Rate—our "Zestimate for B2B prospects") using signals like hiring activity, funding, tech installs, and engagement patterns

Create human-in-the-loop systems that know when to escalate to human review—balancing automation with brand safety

Ship production ML infrastructure including model serving, monitoring, feedback loops, and A/B testing frameworks

Collaborate with product and operations to translate messy real-world problems into ML solutions that actually work

Improve data pipelines for enrichment, deduplication, and signal extraction across millions of professional profiles

What We're Looking For

Required:

3+ years of experience building ML/AI systems in production (not just notebooks)

Strong Python skills; experience with ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, or similar)

Hands-on experience with LLMs—prompt engineering, fine-tuning, or building applications on top of GPT-4, Claude, or open-source models

Understanding of NLP fundamentals: embeddings, classification, entity extraction, semantic search

Experience with vector databases (Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector) and RAG architectures

Comfortable with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and containerization

Ability to ship iteratively—we value working software over perfect plans

Preferred:

Experience with sales/marketing tech, lead scoring, or B2B data enrichment

Background in building conversational AI or agent-based systems

Familiarity with workflow orchestration (Temporal, Airflow, or similar)

Experience at an early-stage startup where you wore multiple hats

Understanding of email deliverability, domain reputation, or anti-spam systems

What We Offer

Competitive salary + equity — Real ownership in a company at an inflection point

Charleston lifestyle — Work from our Mount Pleasant office with a team that values work-life balance. Beach nearby, cost of living that doesn't require VC salary

Impact at scale — Your code will touch thousands of campaigns and millions of data points. You'll see results, not just metrics

No bureaucracy — Small team, fast decisions, direct access to customers and leadership

Mission that matters — We're restoring trust to an industry drowning in spam. The best professionals should win on merit, not volume

Our Stack (Current)

Python, Node.js

PostgreSQL, Redis, vector databases

AWS (primary cloud)

OpenAI, Anthropic APIs (with room to evolve)

React frontend

How to Apply

Send your resume and a brief note on what excites you about applied AI to [email protected] or apply directly at topline.com/careers.

Bonus points if you include:

A project you shipped that you're proud of

A time you chose pragmatism over perfection

Your take on where AI agents are headed in the next 2 years

Topline is an equal opportunity employer. We're building a team as diverse as the professionals we serve.

Topline — Outcomes over optics. Merit over hype.