How to Prepare For an MBA Product Marketing Internship Interview

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How Do You Prepare for a Product Marketing Interview?

So you’ve submitted your application and landed a Product Marketing MBA Internship interview – congrats! But how do you prepare and set yourself up for success? 

To find the answer to this question. I spoke to five recent MBA students who successfully landed MBA Product Marketing Internships and asked them a few questions about how they prepared for Product Marketing Interviews. The following are real experiences, reflections, and tactics that you can use yourself to properly prepare for your internship interviews for MBA Product Marketing Internships.

A big thanks to the following students are featured in this article:

MBASchooled: What was your interview process like?

Maggie O’Neill: I saw a posting for a Product Marketing Internship on LinkedIn and applied by dropping my resume. A few days later, I got an email from the hiring manager to schedule a phone interview. The process was as follows:

  • Phone Interview 1: I had a 30 minute phone interview the following week with the hiring manager 
  • Phone Interview 2: A few days later, had an hour long phone interview with the VP of Product Marketing
  • Writing Sample: After the second phone interview I sent a writing and presentation sample to the hiring manager and VP PMM
  • Final Onsite: I was invited to ThoughtSpot’s office in Sunnyvale for a full-day interview. During this onsite, Interviewed with Customer Success, CMO, VP Corporate Marketing, Director of Product Marketing, and Director of Sales, East. Also had lunch with the hiring manager and did a product demo (him showing me) with the VP PMM, and received an offer the following day 

Jessica Hatz:

  • 1st Round: 15-20 minute phone screen with recruiter, generally a call to get to know me and to see if I would be a fit with the culture. I told the recruiter about myself, why I was interested in the tech industry, and why VMware specifically.
  • 2nd Round: 4 back-to-back 30-min interviews (with a 15 or so minute break in between each interview) with 4 different teams. These interviews consisted of a mix of behavioral and marketing-related case questions. Additionally, some interviewers wanted to know about my marketing background, why I am interested in product marketing specifically, and what excites me about the company 

MBASchooled: What was your process for preparing for a company interview for a Product Marketing Role?

Tori Chang: As I prepared for my PMM interviews, I did a mix of introspection and research. PMMs are expected to be strong communicators, so it was important for me to articulate my learnings and personal motivators in a concise and effective manner, whether it was during my elevator pitch or in response to behavioral questions. 

 

On the research side, I knew that PMMs are expected to analyze and consolidate multiple (and sometimes ambiguous) datasets into crisp, actionable insights. Furthermore, PMMs should have a point of view and provide recommendations to PMs on the roadmap forward. I did a ton of research, playing around with the product and competitor products, empathetically forming a point of view on the products’ pros and cons from the perspective of different consumer segments. I also performed a SWOT analysis on the industry, to help me understand the company/ product in context. This mix of both high-level and feature-level analysis helped me stand out when answering technical interview questions.

Annelies Paine: I first focused on nailing the behavioral questions I knew I was going to get (Why PMM, why Adobe, why tech etc.) and putting together some STAR stories about my past experiences. Then I focused on company research, with a special focus on the product team I was interviewing for. This included watching CEO speeches, watching conferences, reading the 10k, and company blogs. Lastly, I spent time preparing for some “soft ball” case questions that you occasionally get in PMM interviews (market sizing, launching product questions). 

Anubhav Rao: 

I have two aspects to my interview preparation:

  • Regular Preparation: This includes:
        • Regular reading about my target companies and their industries
        • Network in my target companies to better understand the culture and opportunities there
        • Practice common behavioral and casing questions related to the PMM interview experience
  • Specific Interview Preparation: If I get an invite, then I used the following process to put my best foot forward:
      • Leverage my network to understand what to expect during the company’s interview rounds 
      • Review the job description and align my stories and previous experience to the requirements of the role
      • Do a deep-dive on the company’s existing and future prospects, its competitors, and the industry trends
      • Plan my questions for the interviewers – make them specific and genuine instead of asking generic questions

Jessica Hatz: Prior to preparing for any company-specific interview, I practiced my “Tell me about yourself” pitch and stories for behavioral interview questions. I also reviewed the marketing framework many times to prepare for marketing-related case questions.

My first step when preparing for a company interview for a PMM role was researching the company in-depth. I would read as much as I could on their website and other resources (LinkedIn, news articles, etc.) to understand the company culture and strategy at a high level.

After doing high-level research, I would dive into product-related resources for the PMM teams I was interviewing for. This involved understanding how the product works, what problem it’s trying to solve, who are customers that use this product, what benefits does the product provide to customers, and finally, how this product fits in with the company’s overall product/portfolio strategy. I watched countless YouTube videos to understand how products worked, read customer case studies and blogs, and reviewed as many eBooks/solution overviews as I could find.

Finally, I would research my interviewers (if their names and information were available) to understand their role at the company. Understanding an interviewer’s role at the company is helpful, because it can help you frame the questions you want to ask the  interviewer. For example, you would likely ask a Senior PMM different questions than a recruiter.

Maggie O’Neill: 

I used a number of different tactics to prepare for my product marketing interviews.

  • Heavily researched the company and industry. Since it’s a startup, I researched their funding rounds, valuation, leadership interviews
  • Researched the product via the company website, press releases, and Gartner reports
  • Utilized Haas Career Center resources to understand Product Marketing roles as much as I could
  • Used RocketBlocks to familiarize myself with tech industry questions, cases, and vocabulary
  • Searched the internet for common PMM interview questions
  • Did several mock interviews with Haas career coaches and alumni

 

MBASchooled: What resources were most helpful to you to prepare for an interview?

Annelies Paine: Talking to Marshall alumni who work at the companies I was interviewing for. Alumni helped me understand the role and get insight into the interview process. My rule of thumb is to never walk into an interview without having to spoken with someone who works in a related role at the company. 

Jessica Hatz: throughout my prep, I relied on four main sources to prepare for interviews:

  1. Company websites – look at the 10Ks, any high-level strategy webpages and blogs, product portfolio page, product-specific webpages
  2. YouTube – super helpful to understand how tech products work, and for listening to company leaders
  3. Various tech-related websites (Geekwire, Network World, Tech Crunch, etc.)
  4. Informational chats with current employees or former interns

Anubhav Rao: There are some really good online resources that helped me in my preparation – 

    • Product Marketing Alliance: They have some amazing resources to help one better understand what a PMM does, the skills needed to succeed in the role, and what to expect in an interview. Their slack community is also a great resource to learn from established PMMs on an ongoing basis
    • Sharebird: It is a great resource to learn from the best of the best about their experiences and what they do to achieve success as a PMM
    • Exponent & Rocketblocks: These two are also good to help specifically with interview prep but they are paid resources
    • Network: My personal network comes in very handy where I am able to get feedback and learn from people who have already done what I aspire to do
    • Twitter and Substack: I personally love these two platforms. They have helped me to understand the language of a PMM, the various challenges, and the strategies/tools to overcome those challenges. This comes in really handy during the interview process

Maggie O’Neill: The two resources that were most helpful to me were:

  • Interview Prep Resources– RocketBlocks was great for getting a general understanding of Product interviews and for learning tech terminology ahead of the interview (I was coming from a non-tech background and even works like ‘API’ were new to me)
  • Career Center – Talking with career coaches at Haas about PMM roles and role playing interviews

 

MBASchooled: What was the toughest question that you got in an interview?

Annelies Paine: The toughest question for me was actually, “What do you want to learn this summer?” During my preparation, I spent so much time thinking about my past experiences and how they mapped to PMM roles, that I neglected to put a lot of thought to what I wanted to take away from the internship experience. Internships are mostly about learning, so make sure you have identified your goals for the summer.

Anubhav Rao: There were a number of questions that were tough, here are a few examples:

    • Tell me about a time when you launched a product and your strategy behind it
    • What do you think are the most important skills for a PMM and how do you possess them?
    • How do you deal with ambiguity and explain those ambiguous concepts to others?
    • Name a good product that’s marketed poorly. What will you do differently to market it?
    • How do you evaluate the success of a product marketing team?

Jessica Hatz:

  1. Tell me about a time when you had a feeling that you may encounter a challenge at work. What was the challenge, did you foresee it, and what did you do to prepare for it and overcome it?
  2. Tell me about a product that your company had. Tell me about the product and the role you had in developing it and bringing it to market.
  3. Can you tell me about a time you had to work under a tight deadline, and didn’t effectively manage to meet the timeline?
  4. Tell me about a time you had to make a hard decision to sacrifice short-term gain to create long-term value for customers.

Maggie O’Neill: 

  • Why Product Marketing over Product Management?
  • Can you tell me what Customer Success does and how you think CS and PMM interact?
  • Tell me a story about a time you failed at something. Ok, now quickly summarize it in 3 key takeaways. 
  • Name a company that you think has great branding. Why?
  • Tell me about a time you’ve dealt with a difficult customer
  • How do you schedule your day? How do you handle unexpected changes in your schedule?
  • What do you think our product does? 
  • What’s your favorite podcast?

MBASchooled: Any parting advice for MBA students who have upcoming product marketing internship interviews?

Jessica Hatz:

  1. Understanding the marketing framework is crucial (5Cs –> Business Goal –> Marketing Goal → STP  → 4Ps)! Work through the framework and practice case-related questions.
  2. Depending on whether you are interviewing for B2B or B2C, it is imperative to understand what stakeholders you will be working with and influencing. For example, in B2B, you will often be delivering documentation for field sales and partners to use and will collaborate with Product Management, marketing and communications, etc. In B2C, this will likely look different. Dive deep into what company you are interviewing for and try to understand what PMM looks like at that company, and what types of collateral you will be responsible for creating.
  3. Have confidence and know your why! Why PMM, why this company, and why this industry.

Maggie O’Neill: Make sure that you have an understanding of these 4 pillars: the industry, the company, the product, and the role:

      • Industry: See if there are any Gartner/analyst/other research reports about what’s going on in the industry. Know who the key players are, how much the industry is growing/shrinking, how your company’s product fits into the market
      • Company: If it’s a public company, read their most recent 10k before the interview. If it’s a private company, try to find their Pitchbook profile or another source of information about their recent funding rounds and growth trajectory. Try to go in with a comprehensive understanding of the company’s growth trajectory, goals, and vision
      • Company: If there are alumni from your school working at the company, make sure you set up calls with them. I did this after I had the offer and I wish I had done it sooner in the process
      • Product: Many companies offer a free trial of their product. Make sure you download it and try it out before the interview so you can confidently talk about the user experience and key product features and highlights
  • Role: PMM looks very different at different companies. This may be hard to do, but if you can, try to understand what kind of PMM work you’ll be doing, how it fits into the goals of the larger PMM and Marketing teams, whether it is customer facing or not, etc. If you can’t figure this out ahead of time, make sure you ask questions during the interview process that leave you with a good understanding of the PMM role.

 

Conclusion: Prepare For Your Product Marketing Interview

As the saying goes, failing to prepare, is preparing to fail.” Make sure to avoid failing in your product marketing internship interviews by setting up your own interview prep process and diligently sticking to it throughout your interviews. With these tips from successful PMMs, you’ll be on your way to internship success.