Product design question
Design a product to improve reading habits.
Practice this question out loud. An AI interviewer asks it, follows up like a real interviewer would, and scores your answer. Type or speak.
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What this question tests
Product design for a behavior-change product, requiring a clear target user and a mechanism that actually builds a habit.
How to approach it
- Segment users: people who want to read more but don't, the intent-behavior gap, versus people who already read but want to read more efficiently.
- Focus on the intent-behavior gap segment, the larger and more commercially interesting group.
- Identify the pain point: reading loses to easier, more immediately rewarding activities like short-form video.
- Design the solution: small daily reading goals, streaks, and social accountability with friends, applying a Duolingo-style habit loop to books.
- Consider content delivery: bite-sized excerpts or audiobook chapters to lower the activation barrier before a full book.
- Define success: 7-day and 30-day reading streak retention, not just app downloads.
What a strong answer includes
- Explicitly borrows proven habit-loop mechanics, streaks and small goals, from Duolingo rather than inventing generic gamification.
- Picks the intent-behavior gap segment and explains why it is the larger opportunity.
- Uses streak retention as the success metric, a meaningful behavior-change signal, not vanity downloads.
- Addresses the activation barrier, a full book feeling daunting, with a lower-friction entry point.
Common mistakes
- Designing a generic book-discovery app instead of addressing habit formation.
- Ignoring the difference between people who lack time and people who lack motivation.
- Measuring success by downloads rather than actual reading behavior.
Likely follow-up questions
- How would you monetize this without hurting the habit loop?
- How would you handle users who read at very different paces?
- What makes someone come back on day 2 versus abandon after day 1?
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- How would you go about designing a new location sharing app for Google?Google · Product design · Medium
- How would you improve Google Home?Google · Product design · Easy
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Learn the skill behind it
Chapters of the AI PM course that teach what this question tests.
- Chapter 4: Discovery and strategy for AI products
- Chapter 7: AI UX and human oversight: design for a system that is wrong sometimes
- Chapter 14: Get the job: the AI PM interview loop