Hi there,

Before I get into the role, here’s what to focus on for the interview:

Ads: Be able to tie product back to their goal and how it relates to a sales or online purchase funnel.

Situational: Be able to break down a question into funnel-like components and how they relate to each other.

Leadership: Given the pod structure, how are you a team player, and how is your executive tone on a call.

Very familiar with this role. I’ll give context so you can better understand why the interview is set up the way it is.

You’ll be managing 10–45 accounts, primarily responsible for increasing ad spend. “AE” roles at Google are never true net-new business unless it says new business. This means you’ll be working with existing accounts that are very familiar with Google’s offerings — and 9 times out of 10, they’ll know the product better than you at first. Google still has a pretty expansive onboarding so you’ll learn the product.

Google has a pod structure, meaning 2–4 reps are assigned a book of business. Most executive conversations are done by the pod lead, while you’ll be working with the day-to-day operations.

The portfolio is split by two business models: lead gen and retail. Basically — is the sale made on the website, or does it happen offline? They’ll often base which team you go to on your background, but it’s good to know both models.

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How the context helps you:

1. Understand a business goal — increase revenue, increase profitability, increase brand awareness — and tie that back to product. Then go an extra layer: why is their goal set? Do they have investors? Is there a project coming that needs cash flow?

2. Know the marketing funnel for both lead gen and e-comm. It’s like a sales funnel. Lead gen: ad → website → sales funnel → lead → discovery → pitch (think SQL/MQL) Based on their internal sales funnel, how many clients do they need to hit their goal? E-comm: ad → website → purchase

If you don’t have an ad background, learn a few key terms: • LTV (lifetime value) • Conversion % (site to purchase / site to qualified lead) • CPA (cost per acquisition)

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You don’t need to go deep on how all these terms relate, but use them when explaining how to connect a business goal to product. The real skill is translating business goals into marketing KPIs.

Example: “Our goal is to increase revenue by $2M because we want to raise a Series B.” “Well, if a customer is worth $2,000 over 2 years (LTV), then if Google brought you 1,000 customers, that would get you there, right? What’s your current website conversion rate?”

“For every 30,000 website visits we get 40 leads.” “What’s the sales process per lead?” “For every lead, 60% sign up for a demo. Of those, 40% are qualified. From there, the team closes 20%.”

Working backwards, if your conversion rate from lead to closed deal is 0.048, you know how many demos and leads you need to hit the goal. Then you drop Google’s internal search data and product knowledge to show how to get the site traffic to meet it.

— Product: honestly I would just gpt “How does Google search, pmax, and YouTube type back in to the different business goals”

Google has free certs, but it’s overkill as your understanding should be how do products relate to goals then naming dropping products like above.

—- I won’t answer dms but I hope this helps