Product Data Science - Improve Google Maps | Google Data Scientist | DataInterview

hey everyone it's dan the founder of

datantv.com ex google and paypal data

scientists in this video i'd like to

cover a topic based on product data

science into a question and the type of

question is the following how would you

improve a product this is the type of

question that's commonly asked in

product data science interviews this is

about putting yourself in the shoes of a

data scientist and company that's

interviewing you and then thinking about

how would you use data and extract

insights that can be meaningful in the

form of hey you know what i have an idea

for a new future or enhancement of a

current future that can help the product

grow

so let's

do a deep dive in terms of how do you

approach this type of problem

um so

i just want to first of all mention that

this is the type of problem because

it's um it's about how would you improve

a product and so you would have a

multiple companies asking similar

questions like this for instance google

might ask a question about you know how

would you improve um google maps and

this is a fairly a fair game sort of

question especially if you're

interviewing for the product analyst

role at google and uber could also ask

questions about you know how would you

improve the user experience on ubereats

you know

the difference is the key word but the

essence of what is the main aim of this

um this type of question is pretty much

the same it's about improving the

product essentially and then the meta

company or formerly known as facebook

might ask a question about should

facebook

create stories and so you can see that

this is also you know you can see that

they might also ask you a question about

hey you know what um we have an idea for

a new future should we actually build

this or not right um but regardless of

whether they actually mention a specific

product that they are or featured that

they want to build out the essence of

how you would approach this type of

problem is pretty much the same so i

want to mention a framework a five-step

framework that is useful in terms of

approaching this type of problem and so

the first thing is to define the goal of

the problem

so this is really where you bring out

you know what is the business objective

and what is the product experience of

this um you know of this type of problem

right and then the step two is walk

through the user journey so this is

really where you do like a high

you know in-depth details in terms of

what is the typical user journey you

know what are the types of users

that use this platform and what's the

user journey from the beginning to the

end right

as soon as they land on the website with

the platform you know what kind of tasks

can they achieve and what sort of

satisfaction um experiences do they do

they get out of this right um and also

talk about the monetization aspect of it

as well um and all of these are

basically a stepping stone for you to

think about

um you know what are ideas that you can

definitely propose to the interviewer

but also at the same time you're

demonstrating to the interviewer that

you have product knowledge about the

company that you're interviewing for and

that is really important

and then the third thing is to

brainstorm two to three ideas that can

be really helpful right so

based on the user experience of the

current platform or the future um you

know can you think of ways to enhance it

right um the last thing you want to do

is mention something that's already

there

and that can be somewhat costly because

the interviewer might think you haven't

really done the research

in terms of the latest sort of user

experience of the

of the product

um so the the third step is to

brainstorm two to three ideas um and

then

the fourth step is to validate uh ideas

using data so

um the last thing that you want to do is

just basically say hey you know what i

have an idea for building a new future

but you're not really able to back it up

with data and so this is where you kind

of put yourself in the shoes of a data

scientist and imagine if you have all

kinds of data right and obviously you

can clarify with the interviewer and ask

the person hey um can i use any sort of

data source or are there particular data

sources i'm sort of restricted to right

and then think about you know what kind

of user events can you

um look into that suggest that users

want this right um and this is about

finding proxy behaviors that seem to

convey us a certain intent and i'll talk

a little bit more about how this works

um as of course like as i go through an

actual illustration in terms of how do

you approach this type of problem

and then the last part is you know now

that you have two to three ideas and

you're able to validate that hey you

know people are actually using you know

wanting to use this um you have to now

prioritize um the ideas based on the one

that the product team should focus on

right and this is really about putting

yourself in the shoes of a product

manager and then kind of thinking about

you know how would you actually

um among these three ideas which one do

you think has the highest sort of ri

um you know with kind of minimum effort

right and so this is about you being

able to prioritize you know what to

focus on and that's a pretty typical

behavior among uh you know

responsibility among data scientists um

you know especially when you have all

these competing ideas what do you focus

on right and that's what the interviewer

wants to see

um so we're going to go ahead and

actually

talk through this type of problem by

going through this exercise um how would

you improve google maps and

you know why don't you actually just

pause the video for just couple seconds

and just kind of think about how you

might respond to this question right

imagine if you're if you if you're a

candidate for the product analyst role

at google

or if you're interviewing for any sort

of product data science interview in

general and you have a product sense

interview coming up

um take take a moment right you know it

could be a couple seconds it could be a

minute or five minutes and just use the

google maps open up the google maps and

just kind of go through the user

experience and think about hey you know

what i wish there were these features it

can be really helpful that would make my

life so much easier right and then think

about how you respond to this as though

you were an actual candidate um so

pause the video and then you know resume

all right so let's

do a deep dive let's apply the framework

that i mentioned in this type of problem

right so the first thing is to really

define the goal of the problem and so

you want to what you want to definitely

want want to walk through um kind of

demonstrate you know some knowledge

about hey you know what i i understand

what this problem is asking right um i

often see as i you know coach um

candidates for interviews

i might ask questions about you know how

do you measure success for you know

platform or how do you um

you know validate whether an idea should

be whether products should be built or

not right

and

the kennedy often have these clarifying

questions and it's really important to

have clarifying questions but at the

same time it's important to be somewhat

intelligent in terms of what questions

you're asking right like you don't want

to ask questions about um you don't want

to ask a clarifying questions you know

oh what what do you mean by success or

how do you want me to measure success

when that is a very question that that

the interviewer is asking and i've often

seen this type of clarifying question as

in like um you know how would you like

um

you know what do you mean by improving

google maps right um

but you don't want to you don't want to

ask that when that's

basically what the interviewer is asking

right um rather the way to sort of frame

this is personal make start with some

assumptions and then clarify to see

whether you're on the right track so you

can kind of lay out a couple things

right so um if i was a candidate you

know responding to this my opening

response was

would be something on the lines of you

know thank you for this question um you

know i think this is very interesting

and very important because um improving

google maps is about really focusing on

three different areas or combination or

maybe one of these areas and

i know that improving google maps can be

in the form of you know improving the

user experience so maybe helping them

achieve a certain task um you know much

quicker it could be about helping to

promote businesses and obviously

businesses can promote themselves and

google maps um by dropping

by by letting users know that hey you

know this business exists on a map but

in a form like a pen and um like a

specific location

and then the last thing is you know

maybe it's it might be in the form of

helping google um google maps generate

you know advertisement revenue right

because that's one of the main

advertisement stream for google maps at

any time you go on the app itself and

sometimes if you click a specific

business you might see like an

advertisement banner in the search

result and so whenever user clicks it

that's um you know basically businesses

that are taking out these advertisements

or paying google for every click

um and so

this you know it could be in that form

as well or maybe there might be this

sort of one idea that might help all of

these three aspects right um so it's

important to kind of first of all

establish you know what does it mean to

improve goal improve you know improve a

product here and start that as like

you're clarifying assumptions right like

make these assumptions and ask the

interviewer you know um are there

particular areas you want me to focus on

or do you just want me to kind of do

like a general some exploration and then

conversion to one idea that i would

probably recommend to a product manager

right that's how you demonstrate

expertise you don't start by asking some

sort of general questions and expect the

interviewer to provide hints for you

um so once you have

established this step the next step is

to essentially walk through the user

experience right and this is something

that um

you know even if it's the type of app

that you've often used maybe it's like

uber or instacart um or whatever it is

um it's it's often easy to just kind of

passively go through like what the core

features are

um i've used google maps often and even

for me when i'm doing this sort of

research um you know in the preparation

for the interview i have to pretend as

though like i'm an actual like ux

designer or uh or you know basically

like put it place myself in the mind of

like a product manager and really

deconstruct the app right um so one

thing i recommend is that if you have a

product data science interview coming up

right whether it's for uber

whether it's for um you know google or

whatever it is right um actively use the

app right and

create a word doc and create an outline

of hey um here's how here's what are the

core functionalities of these features

and here's what the user experiences are

from the beginning to the end right and

that is gonna be incredibly helpful that

map in your mind is gonna be incredibly

helpful whenever you need to address

questions like this

um so

um so how i would respond like you know

further build on my response would be

like okay first of all i just want to

walk through the user experience here

because i think this is important as a

stepping stone um for me to think about

what potential ideas there are right um

what ideas could perhaps enhance google

maps now i know that um

at its core there are two types of user

bases so there's the regular users like

myself the commuters who loves to

navigate through uh things right like i

need to go from point a to point b i

need to browse places right like maybe

i'm trying to look for new eateries um

like music venues to go to

um maybe maybe i just want to do like a

specific search right there's like a

search bar i can search like um places

to eat or something like that right so

those are one of the core

functionalities and of course there are

a lot more right um but generally just

follow the rule of three like you don't

want to like overwhelm the uh interview

with so many things and the next thing

you know you're not really ever able to

cover the main things right so just

start by focusing the core

functionalities um and then kind of

provide some details from there right

the other aspect of

of the user

user group could be like businesses

right so businesses can definitely

establish their location on google maps

so they let other people know that hey

um you know this steakhouse exists in

san francisco you know maybe you should

definitely check it out

um and they can also take an

advertisement as well right um you know

as a way to promote um you know maybe

like uh like a particular service or

something like that right

um and i'd often see it like every time

i look up like you know restaurant in

the search banner i often see like

advertisements from like postmates or

ubereats because they obviously have

some partnerships

um you know with these

with these restaurants in terms of

delivering you know food to consumers

right and so they would

take out these advertisements um so

these are the user experience these are

one of the core sort of user experience

on google maps and once you have

demonstrated this you show that into you

show to the interviewer that hey you

know the product knowledge but also at

the same time um you know like this is

also going to help you come up with

really cool ideas

then the the third step is really the

sort of like entrepreneurial side of

things right this is where you have to

like come up with

um ideas that have been really helpful

helpful for

improving google maps and so right off

the bat

so i can think of three ideas right and

and it can really start from your own

personal experience but also it can

start from by saying hey you know um i

would actually do some investigation

data and then kind of extract what

potential behaviors users are expressing

and then from there come up with some

ideas that can help remove these

friction points that they're suffering

through right

um so there's all these different angles

in which how you would approach this but

in terms of like what you do afterwards

it's exactly the same and i will show

you what i mean by this in a second but

basically the three ideas i have are

this so and i really wish google maps

would actually um build it so if anyone

from the google maps team is watching

this um please add these features

um

so the first thing is eta planning so

what i mean by this is like you know how

like when you're searching to like when

you're trying to navigate to a place

like

it shows the eta in real time like the

current moment of what the eta is

but what if you're doing like a plan for

like a trip elsewhere right and you want

to see what typical eta is um given

various time of the day right it's like

i live in san francisco and sometimes i

like to go to santa cruz um and like

some i notice that there's a lot of

variability like sometimes there's

traffic like heavy traffic on like

thursday afternoon i'm like what the

heck is going on like who goes to santa

cruz on thursday afternoon and stuff

like that and

and it kind of makes you wonder like

you know it would be nice if you can

kind of like look at trends right

historical trends of like what the eta

is like pick out a day and a time and

then um and then the location and then

be able to see you know what has been

the general sort of eta for this time at

any point in time right and that could

be really helpful for people trying to

make trips like any certain commute if

especially if you move to like a new

city and you want to do a little bit of

exploration outside of the city or

through the city um you know like that

sort of look up will be incredibly

helpful and i do see that like there's

some aspect of this um on google search

itself whenever you search like a

business um like a restaurant or

something like that they do have like

these bar chart that shows like how busy

um a restaurant typically gets

um so i certainly wouldn't see why like

google maps cannot have something like

that for eta as well and then the second

thing is street parking information so

how often

do you drive to like an urban area like

a city or a new city right and you're

struggling to find a parking spot right

and you don't really want to pay for

like a parking garage because they can

be someone expensive especially in a

city like san francisco where you're

paying like 20 an hour or something like

that you know

um and so a person like me would

typically look for street parking but

then like when you look it up on google

maps like there's no information about

like what are areas where i could do

street park water areas i can't if i

knew that information in advance i would

probably go to that street right

otherwise i have to drive around

and

you know when you drive around san

francisco my god it's a pain in the butt

there's all these runways and hills and

um there's all these signs like

sometimes it's comp like they kind of

conflict each other like the one sign is

saying you know don't park at from four

to six and then another sign is saying

you know uh you're allowed to park and

it's on the same street and so it's like

really confusing and so it's you know

it'd be incredibly useful if google maps

can help find that information right

and then the third thing is you know

local um this is this can be really

helpful for local uh you know venues

right so i i love going to happy hours i

love doing these special events that um

that music like theaters and restaurants

and bars hosts and stuff like that and

it'd be nice if the advertisement

display that shows up in businesses um

are actually from these local businesses

promoting some events right and this can

be really helpful in terms of like users

looking for these type of events but

also venues as well to attract new

customers to bring back current

customers um and also it can be helpful

for google because it can help them

generate advertising revenue so you

start by like laying out a couple ideas

right and then eventually you say okay

um what i would probably do is um do

some like validation to see

whether people would be using this right

and so

um the next step is basically you know

you know validating using data right so

in terms of the eta planning like how

can you validate this idea so you can

look at um search histories right search

routes where like users have searched

for a particular location but they did

not physically move right and this could

be indicative that hey you know what

they're doing some planning sir right

they don't want to just kind of get a

general understanding of how long it

takes to actually commute somewhere

right um

so if there's enough volume with this

type of search maybe it's indicative

that hey you know what we could

definitely build out this type of

feature that can be really helpful for

users right

and then the in terms of street parking

information this could be like in the

form of people who search you know who

are um

basically they search for parking spots

right and and they parks cars on the

street instead of like a parking garage

um and this could be

you know this once again like look at

the volume of this type of search right

um

and that could be indicative of whether

this

whether there's potential demand for

this type of future and then the last

thing is you know users who search um

events like happy hours and and shows

right so you can

so google has a way to like track you

know from people who are using like

google maps to just a regular google

search as well right so

so see like are there type of users who

are searching for particular location or

like a business and then they happen to

search like you know

like uh happy hour at this restaurant

called a bar called bargerack or

something like that and and see and

basically find that history and if

there's enough volume for that you know

maybe there's um

you know it's suggested that hey you

know what this could be really helpful

for uh you know for

for the the type of users that i just

mentioned earlier

um so the last thing is to prioritize

which idea to build and

one way to approach this is basically

using this prioritization framework it's

called impact versus effort analysis and

this is often used in product managers

um

and consultants as well and you can

bring this out as a way to think about

how you would actually value which idea

to focus on

um you know and and that's really really

powerful way to show to the interviewer

that you know you know how to basically

um basically define a scope of a problem

and then be able to figure out like what

to focus on right

um and so this this impact versus the

effort analysis basically for each idea

you're evaluating whether

um you know whether this has low medium

or high impact and whether it has a low

medium and a high effort and ideally you

want to go pursue an idea that's going

to return high impact with low effort um

and as opposed to a high impact and

high effort and of course there are some

exceptions to that but generally you

know that's what's um you know that's

what's desired right because you want

something that's gonna give you the

highest sort of ri you know minimum

effort and maximum return and so

um so you can kind of approach each of

the idea based on this and and and can

say you know um

based on

the ma you know based on this analysis

um

um i can say that you know eta planning

would be low impact and low effort and

and and you can and and basically you

would obviously have to kind of justify

in terms of why that is right so if i

were to sort of approach this like i

would say like you know um so

in terms of just sort of looking at the

impact here like um

this is how rank it so i think the eta

planning is low street parking

information is medium and event planning

is high

even banner is high um and the reason

why i ranked it this way is because um

i

think that even though there are types

of users who may want to do some ata

planning i just don't believe that there

would be high enough volume and

obviously we can kind of validate it

through data um and and at the same time

this is not like a must-have feature

right it's it's like nice to have but it

wouldn't be like the main sort of um

functionality that people would often

use and so that's why i think the impact

is low um i think the street parking

information is definitely

you know relatively speaking compared to

eta planning it's higher than low it's

it'd be medium um

you know because people commute a lot

and

you know this this type of information

can be really helpful and remove a lot

of friction points for a lot of

commuters out there especially if

they're looking for parking spots

um but i don't believe it will be as

high as

the event banners right so because this

not only helps

users find locations or events that they

want to go to but also helps businesses

and especially during the pandemic time

you know as a lot of these venues are

you know reopening they're they're

trying to attract customers regain old

customers through these um sort of happy

hours and events and so they're

perhaps a really good medium a way for

them to like you know um send out any

sort of events that they're hosting

right and so these event banners can be

incredibly helpful but at the same time

it could be additional source of revenue

stream for google ads so we're serving

all three aspects of this and given that

that's why i think the impact is impact

would be really high

but in terms of the level effort that is

required

um i believe that eta planning is low

because it doesn't really require much

sort of

major revamp on the engineering besides

um you know looking at historical trend

and aggregating it and then

you know basically storing it somewhere

and displayed it on um you know on

google maps uh so there wouldn't be much

kind of sort of cross-functional um you

know um coordination that is required to

build out this functionality now in

terms of street parking information i

could definitely see it being high

because you have to be able to extract

information at a street by street level

and sometimes that can change and um i

could think of like obviously this might

require um

a coordination with the

with some software engineers and machine

learning engineers um as a way to parse

this information in the form of like

some urban database like a municipal

database or like computer vision right

because you know google maps um

or google earth has all these different

images of you know like the street by

street and they might they could perhaps

extract you know what is the latest sort

of street information uh from these

signposts that are on you know that are

on the street um that lets them know

whether a car can be parked or not right

um but that kind of

effort would be um would be hard in

terms of um the engineering effort that

is required to build something like this

um and and similar thing i would say the

level effort that's required to build

out this event banner would obviously

require coordination among the

advertisement team um

the uh basically you know attracting

like new customer like advertisers for

this type of banner uh that might take

some time

um it it takes time to basically do a

bit of like a redesign on the um on

where this type of advertising gets

displayed and stuff like that so i

believe that the effort itself would be

fairly high um

and in terms of which one i think we

should pursue is that um i think the

idea should be even better because as i

mentioned earlier um you know this not

only even though the effort in

you know is is as high compared to like

other uh features per se in terms of the

impact that we're getting from this

would be really um you know really

powerful for

uh you know users who are browsing for

venues to go to uh businesses and

advertising revenue and so i think um

going pursuing this idea will be

would be important and

you know you just ended it with that and

of course you mentioned additional sort

of caveat saying um you know of course

like obviously this requires

conversation with product managers and

engineering managers and eventually kind

of converge toward which idea to focus

on and it'll be it through meetings and

kind of documentations and you would

obviously flesh it out but in terms of

just like the information i currently

have i think this is the best idea to

pursue um and so you mentioned that as a

caveat but also at the same time you're

showing that you have real life

experience in um and being able to um

you know

basically approach this type of problem

and that's really what the purpose of

these interviews are so

so that can be really helpful

so there you have it guys you know so

those are the five steps um

in terms of how would you approach a

problem about improving your product

now if you if you like this type of

content make sure you check out

datantb.com

because it contains courses um contains

a b testing product cases question banks

and like mock interview videos that are

really helpful for your interview prep

but also at the same time there's also

coaching services so you can um pair up

with an instructor like myself and then

i can give you like a personalized mock

interview for the meta um data scientist

interview google data scientist review

pretty much any data sentence interview

um and so make sure you check out

datantv.com and i will see you in the

next video

bye