Francis Wayland Ayer (February 4, 1848 – March 5, 1923) was an American advertising businessman.

[1] Ayer's mother died when he was three years old, and his father remarried Harriett Amanda Post.

Ayer taught in district schools and spent one year studying at the University of Rochester before moving to Philadelphia.

There he was hired by a religious newspaper for the position of an advertising solicitor, but by 1867 he founded the company N. W. Ayer & Son, which he named after his father to give a degree of longevity and credibility to the business.

[3] Francis Ayer died from pneumonia at his country home at Meredith, New York on March 5, 1923, and was buried at Laurel Hill Cemetery.