Sr. Software Engineer (PHP)

Be essential at Cars Commerce

At Cars Commerce, we’re fanatical about simplifying everything about car buying and selling. We do right by our customers and consumers to better connect the industry with simplified and tierless technology to enhance, measure and drive local automotive retail. Whether through our No.1 most recognized marketplace, Cars.com, our industry-leading digital experience, Dealer Inspire, our trade and appraisal technology, AccuTrade, our reputation-based digital wholesale auction marketplace, Dealerclub, or our new Cars Commerce Media Network, Cars Commerce is essential for success in the automotive industry.

No one ever travels alone here: at its core, Cars Commerce is collaboration. In fact, it’s built into the very fabric of our shared values. We like to say we Rise Together – putting people at the center of what we do, from consumer to customer to community. Life at Cars Commerce makes it easy when we share the ethos to be Open to All, encouraging open-minded communication because we know diverse thinking yields better outcomes. But critical to our success is Caring to Challengeand Taking Ownership, fueling a competitive spirit in a respectful environment where we think about tomorrow but act today. At our foundation, we have integrity, Doing the Right Thing, even when it’s hard. It’s our shared commitment to these values that makes Cars Commerce a place where growth becomes not only possible, but downright unavoidable.

But don’t take our word for it. As a U.S. News & World Report Best Company to Work For in 2024, we're obsessive about the employee experience. We are among the top 20% being declared “Best” of our industry based on six critical factors that are important to employee wellbeing, like quality of pay, benefits, work life balance and more.

ABOUT THE ROLE [Remote, may require onsite interviews] -

Join us in shaping a future of Automotive Commerce. Cars Commerce builds solutions for automotive dealerships, manufacturers, and consumers. Our driving force is to deliver a single platform that simplifies everything about buying and selling cars. Our Websites Engineering Team drives our Dealer Inspire platform. We are embarking on a transformational journey, building innovative and integrated services that redefine how we deliver value to our customers. 

Cars Commerce is unifying the car-buying journey on a single, data-driven platform, and Core Services supplies the identity, inventory, lead-delivery and data-streaming capabilities on which every brand in our portfolio relies. As a Senior Software Engineer, you'll be a part of a team that owns several high-throughput, API-first services and an end-user web application that serves our dealer customers

As a Senior Software Engineer on our Websites Engineering Team, you will help revitalize our customer-facing tooling across our platform with a comprehensive technical strategy to simplify and amplify these user experiences and the capabilities they enable. This is an exceptional opportunity to shape the future of our platform and drive meaningful change at scale, making a lasting impact within the automotive industry.

ABOUT YOU -

As a Senior Software Engineer, you are a part of our newly formed team responsible for the "heartbeat" of our digital experience. The Consumer Engagement team has been tasked with building a real-time interaction layer between car buyers and dealerships, processing millions of signals to create personalized, frictionless journeys, generating actionable leads for our customers

You are an experienced, results-driven software engineer who thrives in building scalable and reliable backend systems. You have a strong foundation in designing and developing API-based services that can handle high traffic volumes while ensuring Observability, Performance, Security, Scalability and Maintainability. You understand software architecture and engineering best practices and are comfortable making technical decisions that balance speed, quality, and long-term stability. 

You are also adept at using architecture patterns and iterative approaches to improve legacy services. You’re comfortable with both hands-on coding and designing backend services that meet evolving product requirements. You understand the importance of testing, observability, and CI/CD pipelines in delivering reliable systems. You have experience working with Kubernetes and containerized services, leveraging orchestration and automation to optimize deployment, scalability, and resilience.