Sahil Sethi

AMA: Klaviyo Former VP-Product Marketing, Sahil Sethi on Product Marketing interviews

November 22 @ 10:00AM PT
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Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
For tenured PMM roles (e.g. team leads/directors or senior/principal PMMs who may not be team leads), I do ask for an assignment We usually give an open question that mi...
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3377 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
Not being able to strongly respond to the question “Can you pitch your product to me ?” Not being ready with good writing samples Not coming with strong examples of your...
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3825 Views
3 requests
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
Good question. As PMMs, our roles touch so many aspects of the company that ROI could be hard to define. My advice to every PMM is to think through the impact of their wo...
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2167 Views
3 requests
How do make sure the resume appeals to the hiring manager for a product marketing role?
Should I just use one general resume or are there different versions of it?
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
As long as you have generally worked in functions in or adjacent to product marketing (e..g content, campaigns, market research etc.), my guidance is to always use one re...
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2021 Views
1 request
What technical questions can we expect for product marketing interviews?
e.g. do we need to do a case study, draw insights from looking at data, etc.
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
For interviews for tenured PMMs (e.g. team leads/managers, or principal PMMs /senior ICs) , it is a common practice to ask for a case study or presentation based on a rea...
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1340 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
“Tell me about a time when you dealt with professional failure” “Tell me about a time when you had to work with an underperforming direct report ?” “Tell me about a time...
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794 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
Note - I don’t always look for autonomy unless I believe it is a key requirement for the role. Many PMM roles require more execution skills, a hustle mindset and someone ...
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698 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
MBA certainly provides access to a network and usually a world-class quality education and introduction to marketing frameworks which are useful in any marketing job. But...
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1796 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
As a hiring manager, I often ask candidates for these exercises if I feel like I need to better understand their thought process. This comes in the form of question promp...
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1449 Views
1 request
How do you showcase to interviewers your work in messaging and positioning, without actually showing documented work?
Also, how to actually show its success, as this is something that may take awhile before seeing a growth trend and can you directly actually attribute a particular success metric on messaging?
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
This is such a good question There are many ways to demonstrate success of messaging/positioning work Talk through the process - Explain your approach to developing mess...
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2947 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
I think the best product marketing candidates have three things in common They are strong on the core requirements for the role. In most cases, it involves a degree of c...
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1101 Views
1 request
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
My favorite question is very simple I ask them “Can you pitch me your product?” (if they come from any marketing role) It allows me to understand their storytelling ski...
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3175 Views
1 request
How do you enable your teams to win when faced with other competitors in your space?
Which materials/key points/key themes you work on for them to know how to show your tool is better that the competitors'?
Sahil Sethi
Freshworks Vice President - Global Product Marketing | Formerly Klaviyo, Qualtrics, Microsoft, MckInsey3y
Differentiators Good messaging smartly incorporates differentiators. Yes messaging is about the outcomes and benefits, it is about the category and the disruptions , it ...
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1576 Views
1 request