Source: Problem prompts adapted from Ace the Data Science Interview — Chapter 10 (“Product Sense”) (Huo & Singh). Model answers and frameworks here are original for this course.
Eighteen product-sense interview questions — metrics definition, root-cause diagnosis, A/B testing pitfalls, pricing, and feature brainstorms. Every one of these is a "talk it out" prompt (no numeric answers), so they all use the write-your-answer format: type your answer, Check requirements, Show model answer, then Mark as reviewed. Product Sense covers the underlying frameworks (AARRR, metric quality, diagnosis steps, A/B pitfalls) if a prompt feels unfamiliar.
Hints: these questions reward structure over cleverness — clarify the goal and stakeholders before naming a single metric, and always pair a headline number with a guardrail / counter-metric. Interviewers are listening for how you'd find out, not just a guessed final answer.
Imagine the social graphs for both Facebook and Twitter. How do they differ? What metrics would you use to measure how these social graphs differ?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “degree”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.2Uber
Using “supply” and “demand”, explain:
Why does surge pricing exist? What metrics would you track to ensure that surge pricing was working effectively?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “supply”, “demand”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.3Airbnb
Using “booking flow”, explain:
What factors might make A/B testing metrics on the Airbnb platform difficult?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “booking flow”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.4Google
Using “upper bound”, explain:
Google currently pays the Mozilla foundation nine figures per year to be the default search engine on Firefox, and Mozilla is now asking for twice that. Should Google take the deal? How would you estimate the upper bound on what Google should be willing to pay?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “upper bound”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.5LinkedIn
Using “engagement”, explain:
Assume you were working on LinkedIn's Feed. What metrics would you use to track engagement? What product ideas do you have to improve these engagement metrics?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “engagement”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.6Lyft
Using “stratified” and “network effects”, explain:
Your team is trying to figure out whether a new rider app with extra UI features would increase the number of rides taken. For an A/B test, how would you split users and ensure the test has balanced groups?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “stratified”, “network effects”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.7Amazon
Using “right-skewed”, explain:
If you were to plot the average revenue per seller on the Amazon marketplace, what would the shape of the distribution look like?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “right-skewed”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.8Facebook
Using “false positive” and “false negative”, explain:
Besides posts Facebook is legally obligated to remove, what other types of posts should Facebook take down? What features would you use to identify these posts? What trade-offs need to be considered when removing them?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “false positive”, “false negative”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.9Amazon
Using “correlation” and “causation”, explain:
The Amazon books team finds that books with more complete author profiles sell more. A team scrapes Wikipedia and Goodreads to automatically fill in more author information, hoping to lift sales, but sales don't change. Why might this be?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “correlation”, “causation”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.10Snapchat
Using “root cause”, explain:
Snapchat saw an overall 5% decrease in daily active users, a trend consistent over the week. How would you go about determining the root cause?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “root cause”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.11Pinterest
Using “nDCG”, explain:
You ship a new search ranking algorithm on Pinterest. What metrics would you use to measure the impact of this change?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “nDCG”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.12Netflix
Using “supply” and “demand”, explain:
A category like sci-fi TV shows has less total watch time than other similar categories. What metrics would you look at to tell whether this is a demand problem (people aren't interested) or a supply problem (there's interest, but the content is bad)?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “supply”, “demand”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.13Apple
Using “segmentation”, explain:
You have data on millions of Apple customers and their purchases at physical retail stores. How could customer segmentation analysis increase a store's sales performance? What techniques would you use to segment brick-and-mortar customers?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “segmentation”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.14Facebook
Using “confound”, explain:
70% of Facebook users on iOS also use Instagram, but only 50% of Facebook users on Android also use Instagram. How would you go about identifying the underlying reasons for this discrepancy?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “confound”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.15Capital One
Using “retention” and “churn”, explain:
How would you assess the stickiness of the Capital One Quicksilver credit card?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “retention”, “churn”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.16Google
Using “pricing”, explain:
You worked on YouTube Premium, an ad-free YouTube bundled with YouTube Music. Launching in a few new countries, how would you determine pricing for each country?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “pricing”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.17Twitter
Using “engagement”, explain:
Should Twitter add Facebook-style emoji reactions (love, haha, sad, angry, etc.) to tweets?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “engagement”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.
10.18Slack
Using “stickiness”, explain:
What metrics would you use to measure user engagement at Slack? How would you tell early whether user engagement was declining?
Minimum 4 words. Your answer must include: “stickiness”.
0 words/ 4 min
Meet the writing requirements, then you can open the model answer.