Metrics question
You are the PM of Friends on Facebook. The % of friending has dropped by 5% over the week. What happened?
- Meta
- Metrics
- Medium
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
Focused root-cause diagnosis for a narrow metric drop.
How to approach it
- Confirm data validity first, ruling out a tracking bug.
- Segment the drop by platform, region, and user tenure, new versus existing.
- Check an internal cause: a UI change to the friend-request flow, or a new privacy default limiting discoverability.
- Check an external cause: seasonality, or people substituting another action like following on Instagram.
- Narrow to the most likely driver.
- Propose a fix or a further test to confirm the cause.
What a strong answer includes
- Rules out measurement error before searching for a behavioral cause.
- Segments by user tenure, since new users typically drive most friending activity.
- Names a plausible internal cause, e.g. a change to the friend-suggestion algorithm reducing surfaced suggestions.
- Considers substitution to another action as a real explanation, not just a decline in interest.
Common mistakes
- Assuming the cause immediately without segmenting by cohort or platform.
- Ignoring that 'friending' might be shifting to another action rather than disappearing.
Likely follow-up questions
- Which user cohort would you check first?
- How would you know if this is really a problem worth fixing?
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- You launched a new signup flow to encourage new users to add more profile information. A/B test results indicate that the % of people that added more information increased by 8%. However, 7 day retention decreased by 2%. What do you do?Google · Metrics · Hard
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More questions from Meta
Learn the skill behind it
Chapters of the AI PM course that teach what this question tests.
- Chapter 9: Prove it paid off: outcomes, economics, and pricing
- Chapter 2: Data fluency: SQL, logs, and reading the truth yourself
- Chapter 14: Get the job: the AI PM interview loop