The Google experience has left me completely confused. It would be an understatement to call it less than satisfying. I certainly wasn't expecting the interviewer to ask me to explain the detailed algorithm used for AdWords. If I knew it, I would have been in Google already.
He kept prodding me for the exact alogorithm, and what formula can be used for ranking ads in the AdWords product. Despite rattling off all the various ways to improve the ranking, I was still getting nowhere since he was looking for that magical formula. And so the "Aha" moment simply never came. Tough luck.
I guess I was also plain unlucky in the fact that I was being interviewed by a person who worked only on AdWords, and therefore, focussed only on it. All my preparation on the wide variety of Google products simply went waste since he didnt seem interested or aware of most other products that I tried to lead him to.
When he concluded with a "Google is looking for generalists who can work on a variety of things. Unlike some other firms that probably hire a specific Product Manager for Pricing Applications (referring to me), we look for people who can work on everything", all I could say was, "Thank You and Goodnight!".
Not the best first interview at ISB. For sure.
If this is a sign of things to come, I better start sounding out my old employer for a possible rehire.
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5 comments:
Hi CK,
I feel below points might be the parameters which can be used in adwords algorithm,
1. Rank of the Link.
2. No of Hits made to the link
3. Page Rank of the Ad.
4. Search Keywords like Company name or organisation name
5. Check when the link is clicked on weekday , weekend or on Holiday.
6. Based upon referer IpAddress, is the link accessed from Govt,NGO,Big Company or Others.
7. Category of the link, is the link which is going to open is company website,online application,
or other type of site.
Now how to increase the adwords revenue.
1. we can bring in more ads into the google search engine by reducing the fontsize of the ads and we can ask customers to pay more for larger font size.
2. we can introduce small images and get more revenues.
3. Make Number of results as 20 under default preference for all google search engine users, so that more ads can be displayed when users search.
4. Introduce Ads for Image Search,news,etc..
Please give me your inputs for the same.
Hey DV,
Great inputs. I answered all the concept and idea related questions since I had done adequate research on those. But what that guy wanted was the perfect algorithm for page rank given only 2 data points: relevence and the bid value. It was the exact mathematical formula that he was asking me. I did manage to come up with some formula but the guy didnt seem too convinced.
Anyways, what else is happening?
-Kiran
But above all, did you get financially better off by the adwords?? :D
Nissim: They threw me out of Products. How financially rewarding can that be? Maybe I should use adwords to advertise myself to Google. Any idea how much it would cost to get my resume attached to keywords like "Ideal Google candidate"?:)
Hi CK,
Getting through interviews is an art. It has nothing to do with the job. I don't see them coming out with any other revenue stream other than AdWords. So now that they are at their at their wits end, they are probably looking for ideas to improve that by asking their potential candidates :-)
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