Every candidate should conduct thorough research on the role & company prior to their interview.

Why it matters: The more information you’re able to gather, the more prepared overall you’ll be. You’ll be more confident as you meet with the interviewing team, making you more likely to leave a lasting impression with them.

Zoom In: The reasoning

1. Demonstrates Preparedness and Interest

The more research you do, the more talking points you have. This shows

Remember back in grade school there was always that teacher’s pet? They were always raising their hand to ask/answer questions. Then the teacher always showed them more attention.

Yea, the same thing works 30 years later in the corporate world. By doing your research, you’re able to ask better questions and have a more educated back & forth with the interviewing team.

2. Helps Tailor Your Responses

By conducting more research, you’re able to figure out a few things:

• Products & services

• Goals & vision

• Pain points

The more research you do, the more you understand these three things. From there, you can tailor your answers to frame yourself as the best solution for them.

3. Enhances Your Questions

Interviewing is a two way street.

As discussed on point 1, it obviously shows interest in the role. But this is also your chance to extract as much information from them as possible to make sure this is the right role for you.

Further - The more questions you ask, the more:

• You are able to turn the interview into a conversation vs. interrogation

• Information you can extract from them to further find out more about what they’re looking for, so you can tailor your answers to frame yourself as the best solution.

4. Shows Cultural Fit

“Requirements” are just one part of the job. Overall fit - aka culture fit - matters, too.

For example, the same Software Engineer will experience different cultures at a F100 Insurance Company vs. a Series A SaaS startup.

Understanding the company culture can help you decide if you will thrive in that environment. It also allows you to communicate how your values align with the company’s, demonstrating that you would be a good cultural fit.

5. Avoids Potential Pitfalls

Researching the company can help you avoid saying something inappropriate or irrelevant during the interview. It ensures that your answers are well-informed and appropriate for the context of the company’s current situation.

How to do it

For this example, we’ll use Chewy. Why? Because I love my dogs and I just had to buy a ton of food for them lol.

1: Website: Chewy.com

So clearly on their website you can see they’re an online pet food company. Simple enough.

Everyone can figure out they sell stuff for dogs & cats. But did you scroll around enough to figure out they sell food for wild birds, horses, and farm animals?

Most people wouldn’t have even thought to check that out and something interesting to bring up to an interviewer.

2: About Section

Clicking to the about section, you find some more content at the bottom that gives some more interesting facts about them.

Basic stuff, nothing crazy, let’s take it a step further. Towards the bottom you’ll see “latest news”, let’s click that.

3: Latest News Section

So immediately you’ll see their corporate overview.

This gives you everything you need to know. Their vision, their “why”, what keeps them going.

As you can see, they’re more than just an online pet store. If you just referred to them as that in an interview, you’ll either not stand out, leave a bad impression, or even get rejected depending on the type of role.

If you referred to them as a partner who personalizes pet services for families, and a company that believes pets ARE family, and a company that’s customer obsessed, you’d stand out.

Morale of the story here, use the buzzwords the literal company uses in their objective statements.

4: Fiscal Results

If you scroll down, you’ll see their public financial statements.

This research will give you a chance to ask them how the role & team directly impact revenue & the bottom line. If they don’t, how else do they make an impact to the company and help them grow?

We’re still in a tough economic climate, so not only is this good info to know for talking points with the interviewing team, but also to know if this role will be financially stable over the long haul.

5: Socials

If you see on their socials, they’re pretty active on all channels. Here’s a post about a cat on someone’s desk. Something to bring up during the “why do you want to work here” question.

You’ll also see on instagram they have an account dedicated to employees - @lifeatchewy - that you can check out to get a sense of their culture.

Finally you’ll see their obsession with customer service in real time. They send their customers packages and flowers all the time. Definitely something to bring up during the interview process.

5: Google Searches

Google the company to see if there’s any news (good or bad) about the company in question.

Here we’ll click on the motely fool - they write pieces on investing in tech & other industries.

Here they provide two good arguments for Chewy:

• People love pets, that’s never going away

• As younger genrations grow up, they prioritize buying online, which obviously benefits them

Great talking points about how this fits into the overall strategy, team, and role you’re interviewing for.

6: Glassdoor

Try to get some inside scoop on them on glassdoor and also check their CEO rating.

If you see there are a few bad replies, make sure to take it with a grain of salt. Most people will only write a review for a bad experience and not a good one. Then again, if ALL or MOST of the reviews are bad, then consider this a potential red flag.

7: Quick check of CEO’s LinkedIn

So we know they’re online/ecommerce for pets. But now that we see the CEO’s linkedin, he’s all about tech and growth. Good news for us if we’re applying to tech oriented roles esp in this market.

8: ChatGPT

Finally - you can use ChatGPT to help scape the internet for you to find the info you need.

A basic prompt may look like “What can you tell me about the company "Chewy?" I have an interview with them coming up and I'd like to conduct some research on them. Please provide me with some information that I could bring up as good talking points, and also information that would let me know if they're a good employer to work for.”

Here’s a screenshot of the summary:

TL;DR

Do your research!

Get the info you need to have a successful interview & show interest in the company, all while making sure this is the right place for you long term.

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If you’re looking for an easy to follow guide on your job search, check this guide I made for $9.99:

If you’re looking to book a call with me directly, you can fill out this form here. Note, replies are a little delayed due to increased demand + busy schedule, so thank you for your patience!