Shopify PM: Choosing and Combining Channels to Collect Product Feedback

You are interviewing for a product manager role at Shopify. The interviewer wants to hear how you collect feedback on a product you are responsible for: which methods you rely on, and why you would pick each one. ```hint Sort the sources before listing them Some feedback shows what people do and some reports what they say; some you ask for and some arrives unprompted. On a commerce platform, merchants, their shoppers and the developers who build apps may each need a different channel. ``` ### Clarifying Questions - Should I describe a product I have owned before, or answer for a Shopify product such as the merchant admin or checkout? - Whose feedback matters most here: merchants, the shoppers who buy from them, or the developers and agencies who build apps and themes? - Is the product still in discovery, or is it live with usage data I can analyze? ### What a Strong Answer Covers - A structured set of methods spanning behavioral and attitudinal, requested and unprompted feedback, rather than a flat list. - Matching each method to the decision it informs and to the product's stage, with its biases and limits. - Reaching the right people on a commerce platform: merchants of different sizes, their shoppers and partners, including merchants who left or never adopted the product. - Turning feedback into decisions: synthesis, weighting by segment and impact, validation with data or experiments, and closing the loop with the people who gave it. - A concrete example showing the methods used in sequence and what changed as a result. ### Follow-up Questions - A large Shopify Plus merchant insists on a feature that most small merchants would never use. How do you weigh that request? - Survey results say merchants love a new feature, but usage data shows few still use it after the first week. What do you do? - How would you get feedback on a feature that is not built yet without steering people toward the answer you hope for?