Product Manager Interviews: Success Metrics (Execution & Analytical)

🤔 Memorizing a set of metrics is not enough to demonstrate product thinking skills in an interview; candidates need to show how they can think like a product manager. 💡 Trade-offs and counter-metrics are crucial to prioritize the right metric and ensure quality, emphasizing the need to consider both quantitative and qualitative aspects of the metric. 💰 The northstar metric for Airbnb is the intersection of value for all three users (guests, hosts, and the company), which is achieved when a booking is made and all parties are satisfied. 🏠 To understand the number of active listings, it is important to consider the number of active hosts, which is determined by the number of new hosts joining the platform and the existing hosts. 📈 Keeping a healthy supply higher than demand is key to keep customers engaged and prevent them from switching to competitors like bookings.com. 📸 The founders of Airbnb took initiative by personally helping hosts take high-quality photos of their listings to improve engagement and views. 🧠 "Why this framework works is because it's simple. This is versus other metrics frameworks which asks you to list down a bunch of metrics that are usually used for internet companies and sure those aren't wrong and it's not terrible. But it's not going to distinguish you from all the other interviewees who memorize the same framework." 💰 "The north star metric being revenue is not optimal if a company prioritizes revenue over user goals, as it may eventually run out of users and engagement to generate revenue."