Product Sense: Inventing and Scoping a New Feature for Meta's Messaging Apps

Come up with a new, inventive feature for chat and design it. The interviewer keeps the prompt open-ended on purpose and says you may assume whatever you need, so choosing the scope is part of the task. Explain which product and kind of conversation you would focus on, whom the feature serves and what problem it solves, what the first version would include, and how you would judge whether it works. ```hint Start from a conversation, not a technology Pick one kind of chat and look for a job its members still finish outside the app, or only after a lot of back-and-forth. A fix for real friction beats novelty for its own sake. ``` ### Clarifying Questions - Which Meta messaging surface should the feature live in: Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram direct messages or chat inside the Facebook app? - Is the goal deeper engagement from people who already chat, a new use case for chat, or winning back a segment that prefers other apps? - Should it serve one-to-one chats, small group chats, or large communities and channels? - Does the feature have to work inside end-to-end encrypted chats, where servers cannot read the messages? ### What a Strong Answer Covers - Explicit choices of app, goal and chat type, since the prompt leaves them open - A specific user segment and pain points rooted in how that segment actually uses chat - Several distinct ideas and a reasoned pick that is genuinely new rather than a renamed poll, reaction or sticker - A concrete first version and flow, including how it behaves for group members who have not adopted it - Success metrics with guardrails, and the privacy, encryption and notification risks ### Follow-up Questions - How would you A/B test a feature that changes how a whole group behaves, not just one person? - If the feature needs to understand message content, how does it work in end-to-end encrypted chats? - In groups that adopt the feature, message volume falls. Is that a problem?