Facebook Product Manager Metrics Interview: Facebook Marketplace

[@tryexponent]

Don't leave your product management career to chance. Sign up for Exponent's PM interview course today: bit.ly/3Dt3KlO

[@Vassili3005]

You are an amazing interviewer. Extremely patient. Which is lovely! But many interviewers I got to talk to are not very patient. So, can you do one interview which is slightly more stressful?

[@khushaalb2688]

why is this so accurate??

[@ShubhamGupta11]

Yeah, rarely came across such polite interviewer 😢

[@danieltannor6647]

Good interview. Some points I think may be worth improving: - I'd justify the metric buckets at the beginning - engagement, ... WHY go for these buckets compared to alternatives. This was mentioned briefly - I'd ask questions and try to understand the current state of marketplace. What are our current numbers? And from there focus either on engagement or monetization - I'd justify why an active user is weekly compared to monthly, and also why one post click would be considered active vs other actions

[@rajathslr]

Loved the way she was able to answer with such confidence. I was thinking of DAU, MAU, Session metrics, No of items posted/sold in a month, net worth of all transaction/month, etc, but I liked the fact that she included the metrics related to bad experiences as well, which was so creative! , thanks for this interview

[@stevenspellberg]

It might be just me but among all the execution interview frameworks available, her was the only one which was most comprehensible and not confusing at all. Great to see Exponent Team

[@stevenspellberg]

Love Stephan's cheerful smile based approach

[@tryexponent]

:)

[@orazulay3616]

This was great! Got my FB interview today! Wish me luck!

[@tryexponent]

Good luck!

[@92Sanki]

How did it go?

[@orazulay3616]

@@92Sanki i bombed, was nervous.

[@92Sanki]

@@orazulay3616 Oh man, that sucks...I'm feeling pretty nervous too, my interview is on Monday. What was your product question if you don't mind sharing?

[@orazulay3616]

@@92Sanki you’re the PM for Ford, and you need to develop a brand new car dashboard that will be displayed in a car show in 6 months. How would you approach this? The feedback I received after the interview: In general he felt that you layed out a good framework to approach the problem and that you had good intuition whilst working through it. He felt unfortunately, that you didn't use your framework in a way that allowed you to get to new solutions that you hadn't already thought of. He felt that you missed a few key steps to approach the problem (didn't mention key trends such as autonomous vehicles, electric cars etc). He felt that you didn't really explore the products that are innovative or too far from what already exists.

[@e.w.6470]

You can not brainstorm metrics. It needs a clear structure to explore. I thought completed the transaction will be the north star metric but it's tricky we cannot know for certain if transaction is complete. Need a proxy metric for that and breakdown it into a couple of L1 metrics.

[@moonshine2468]

Great interview ! One more thought on improvement is that when understanding the user value, it would be nice to follow the user journey and identify the key matrix for user action

[@ChrisB-hb9uq]

Also was the original video slowed down for YT? I recommend watching this at 1.5x speed - you can still hear them very clearly!

[@TranceMee]

To the interviewer could you please go over your setup? I see you're using a lavalier mic but also using airpods, presumably for audio? The video quality is excellent, are you using a webcam or something else? The camera angle is bang on, which is wonderful because it gives a sense of an in-person interaction. In today's virtual world it's ever important to have the tech set up correctly for seamless communication and interview experience.

[@chops386]

Super professional he’s using a camera, not a webcam. I asked the same question months ago!

[@TranceMee]

@@chops386 Ah I figured - what video did you ask under? I'll go digging and figure out his setup! :)

[@donmeswimee]

Good interview for APMs, not a great one for anyone with experience

[@nikhilmulchandani1731]

Is number of listings on a weekly basis, a good metric to depict NSM?

[@ajit597]

Great work Exponent team!!! 👏👏

[@tryexponent]

Thank you 🙌

[@UdayPratapSingh999]

Can someone please define the term "metrics" in this context? I will be grateful; I am not sure what exactly does metrics mean in this context.

[@RocketPropelledWombat]

My sentiments too. Maybe something you'd have to ask, I guess. My rule of thumb would be that it's a social media company so retention & time spent online are the two most important metrics. This is a weird one because Marketplace isn't social media per-se, so it might be a matter of how many sales are made and how fast, how reliable and smooth the transactions were etc., because happy sellers & buyers will return to use the service and take business from the competition such as eGay. Plus now you have FB pay (or whatever it's called), so the more people using that the better, which will be an important metric.

[@italia0141]

Can a project manager become product manager?

[@shaktisinhjadeja6277]

Yes, why not

[@snowmass5310]

Yes

[@NikhilGupta-zo2jf]

How about measuring average length of time for a listing to decipher whether a sale was made or not?

[@intekhabkazmi4921]

What happens when you are unfamiliar with the company's mission? Can you google it doing the interview?

[@tryexponent]

Hi intekhabkazmi4921! There are two situations to consider: 1. If you’re interviewing for Company X and the interviewer asks about Company X. 2. If you’re interviewing for a position at Company X and the interviewer asks about another company, Company Y. In the first situation, you should already know Company X’s mission and vision since you’re applying to work there. In the second situation, you can ask the interviewer if it’s okay to look up Company Y’s mission or if they can provide the information.

[@hrishikeshmanjunath8518]

Great Video!! Keep em coming haha

[@tryexponent]

Thanks!

[@JL-qf3hq]

Fascinating, and great interview! Very easy to follow. Does Facebook segment user types by demographics or psychographics? Like specifically optimizing for boomer, mid-size town, retiree, hobby trading, etc. vs. young professional, urban, … I would assume they have different usage behaviors, expectations, impediments or blockers, delighters, etc Also would it be bad to talk about potential product ideas during a metrics interview? Seems natural as it isn’t measurement for measurement sake, likely some action will take place in response to the results, whether good or bad? For example monitoring product, seller, buyer quality and discouraging or banning bad actors, as a few bad actors (eg. Scammers) may stink up the whole market place. Or perhaps having a product photo optimization tool to help sellers move product fast with a more appealing listing. Thanks!

[@Norainjoe]

No different types of personas. Weekly vs cyclical users should have been considered

[@kakashiluver95]

what would you say is the main differences between product management and technical product management? Im trying to decide between the two if I sign up for your courses.

[@tryexponent]

Hey tah! All of Exponent's courses are included in the membership plan - you can choose after you buy :)

[@kevinshen9894]

Great content about FB interview. well done

[@aniketmi1]

Good interview

[@DASilly_dragons]

Very thorough.

[@BrendinDP]

Throwing in every buzzword that has ever existed 😂

[@hahandroo]

She talks so fast.. I thought I was listening at 2x lol

[@Jerry-ep4yg]

Its interesting no one talks about finances during the Exponent Mock interviews. As a PM - Have things changed in the Product Manager world? Is money free?

[@MarkPharaoh]

It’s far less important in this specific interview. FB prints money via ads and care much less about financial metrics for non core products. If this was a DS interview I would try to call out something such as: for marketplace users, does marketplace increase engagement across other FB products? Does the ARPU for that user base go up? But other then that my focus for anything not FBAds specific is going to focus mainly in engagement.

[@pooh1989kolkata]

Awesome!

[@hold121]

long winded = basic rules being blurted out over and over again without any great insight

[@RaviKant-mw4ew]

She is not clearly speaking

[@rishnu5075]

It's hard to understand the way she is explaining. Unstructured and repetitive.

[@MarkPharaoh]

Was quite clear to me, if perhaps a bit repetitive, which is fine to make sure your points get across. But unstructured? This is a textbook product sense response to FB interview questions.

[@huichen3556]

Too much talking at the beginning

[@kickassgoat]

Wow if you Stanfords got into Facebook with such easy interviews, you didn't get in because of experience or talent 😆, which explains why FB is such a detriment to society.

[@nupurgautam1]

Really made me cringe, her explanation is no where close to how Marketplace actually works...

[@luvsmearer]

I think she was really clear.Can we connect to understand how you think the marketplace actually works?