Ask HN: interview with a "deal of the day" company

1 pointsby mindball15 anni fa5 comments

I am a new university business grad interviewing for an account manager position in one of the bigger deal of the day sites. I have two years experience as an account manager during my university career with a small internet based web development company. My job was to source clients who needed a website designed or redesigned and negotiate a deal to fit their needs. I was also the facilitator for communication between the client and the programmers and in charge for taking payment etc. I was responsible for coming up with new ideas for the company to make money (apps, blog networks etc) - We built these up and would sell them often within 3 months of launch. This is the only related experience I gained during my university career aside from doing the general landscape, campus jobs. I have always been very entrepreneurial building and flipping websites throughout high school and into university.

I am wondering what to expect in the interview. The job entails inside telephone business to business selling, cold-calling, prospecting, negotiating and closing business at owner level. I am to meet with the recruiter who will be giving me an overview and then will meet for a one on one interview with the sales manager.

I will be researching the industry throughly and figuring out the leaders, how this company differs from the rest and where the company fits within the industry.

What type of attire I should wear? (it is an internet based company) What types of questions will I be asked? What type of compensation is fair for this position? ($40k-$50k base + commission etc)

Any other tips will be greatly appreciated.

2 comments

AN44715 anni fa

I work for one of these places. I'm sure you can guess which one.

Please wear a suit, when you get the job you're able to wear what you like. I am assuming the culture of the UK offices will be fairly similar to the US ones.

The questions I got were

1) In your own words tell us what our company does (I gave an analogy to explain)

2) Explain our business model

3) Who are our target consumer (educated, females with lots of disposable income)

4) What are your core strengths

5) Tell me about your hobbies

6) What can you tell me about the office environment from just looking around (we have glass windows everywhere so nothing goes un-noticed - work is alot like university)

7) What do you want to do in 5 years?

mindball15 anni fa

Thanks for the feedback. Were you interviewing for a sales job?

mahyarm15 anni fa

Wear biz casual, dress shirt with nice pants. A quick look at glassdoor says your wage estimates are about right, but make sure it's possible to get $30k+ in commission for the average account manager! (I don't know the average total compensation for an account manager although)

mindball15 anni fa

Thanks for the reply. Business casual it is. Do you have an idea what the carrying quota per month/quarter would be?

mahyarm15 anni fa

No idea, I haven't worked for a sales heavy tech company before.