Mastercard Advisors Consultant Interview Questions, Process, and Tips

Q1. Tell me something about yourself.
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An airline company came to master card to launch a co-branded card in India. The airlines have seen revenues pick up again in the covid year and we need to formulate a GTM Strategy for the same.
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate] 

I: Let us formulate a GTM Strategy.

C: (Started with clarifying the problem statement & then moved to asking preliminary questions)

I: (Interviewer gave more context) As travel picked post COVID, ticket prized have gone up and people have resumed traveling, in fact they are keen.

C: Okay. Is our client a low-cost carrier? Also, asked a brand image related question.

I: Yes, client is a low-cost carrier, with a young vibe.

C: (Kept it conversational, took a minute, the interviewer was supportive & sweet) Before we deep dive into the GTM strategy, I would like to understand a few things:

1. Current scenario/Gap

2. Competitor

3. Who can we target?

Does that sound fair?

I: Yes, please go ahead.

C: Mentioned that the customer base should mainly consist of GenY (Business class & travelers of the right age who use air travel often so millennials).

I: Agreed.

C: Asked questions related to current scenarios, like: what loyalty programs, website or app that is operational, how we give discounts?

I: Yes, for the customers. Clients currently don’t have a loyalty program in place, they work through already existing aggregators to give discounts. And they don’t have an app or website (Interviewer liked one of these questions)

C: What is our competition doing? Do they offer loyalty programs? What do we know about what competition is doing differently? (The latter most question can be framed in many ways)

I: They do offer loyalty programs and hence we have been told they have higher retention. Now, Anushruti, I want you to think on “How can they go to market?”, assume we have the product or card ready we don’t need to design the specifics of the product. Take a minute if you like.

C: (Took a minute) I went back saying I would broadly divide the decisions in two parts:

1. Identifying the TAM (STP)

2. Marketing (Awareness & demand gen) and walked her through my thought process briefly.

I: (She gave direction to the conversation, I was confident so the conversation wasn’t dropping low at any point neither was she being difficult, so relax and stay at it: focus on building the conversation) Wanted me to think on GTM more, how will I plan?

C: Took a minute before responding and went back with the What/When/How/Who structure (it was a two-level structure). Walked her through it and checked with her before I walked her through all my ideas. (It was conversational, she was satisfied and asked another question)

I: Now, assess if it is feasible for Mastercard to launch such a card, what parameters to consider seeing its validity.

C: In our target demographic, check for patterns based on the data Mastercard has:

i) Spend using credit v/s debit (especially in this industry)

ii) Check with airlines to see what data they have on bookings made in the region (different channels, traffic)

iii) Cobranded card performance, etc. (elaborated on these lines)

Metro stations have huge real estate to offer for brands to market themselves and recently they had started capitalizing on the same by offering the space outside of metro stations as well as inside, capturing larger audience on the road and inside the metros.

Now imagine you are an edible oil company, say Saffola and estimate how much you should pay for
advertising on this large scale at Gurugram metro station (the last metro station).
I had questions but even before I started thinking about how to solve it, I repeated the guesstimate and my understanding of it.

In the process, we discussed how the impact for Saffola will be based on the footfall and the brand visibility created which the interviewer called ‘pay per eyeball’ (like pay per click): so, we basically want to estimate the number of eyeballs this investment can fetch Saffola.

(Guesstimate was fairly simple from here but the application was new with some slight nuances added to it).

Now I started thinking about how to solve it. Approach: (Clarified some preliminary questions to understand typical customer base and who are we targeting so that I can create target segments). I had established that there can be three types of customers we would have:

1. Homemakers

2. Gen Y: Young professionals (who want to have home-cooked meal, develop healthy habits)

3. Chefs/Tiffin-services/maids: basically, others who influence the decision of buying edible oil at homes

Now thinking about who all from our above segments maybe using the metro station or get exposed to the ads, the 2nd type took the highest priority. Solved the guesstimate using four main levels (starting from taking Delhi’s entire population):

1. Age: 20-45 which was 35% of the population (shared the breakup and how I came to 35%)

2. Income level: 70% of the population is either mid or low middle income which I wanted to consider

3. Working in Gurugram: Assuming 3 main work-centers in Delhi i.e., Noida, Gurugram and central or rest of Delhi: took 1/3rd of the population from 2.

4. Gender: Split them between men and women + assumed half the men are now actively engaged in cooking or being the direct audience, calculated a number.

Here the customer type 1 & 2 were minority, so we didn’t consider incorporating them. Though, the interviewer did ask what is missing here?

The people who never used the metros but saw the add on the road crossing the metro is a segment we left out but again a small segment and can be estimated using a logical %.

I decided not to (80-20). Now instead of taking a number for how much to pay per eyeball to get a final estimate the interviewer closed the case. I checked to calculate but it wasn’t required.

Q1. Tell me something about yourself and a follow up question on hobbies.
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A tyre manufacturing company is seeing a decline in sales. Investigate.
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate]

C: Clarifying questions on size of the firm, presence of other competitors, product portfolio local brands, etc.

I: Among the top brands nationally but the company is facing competition from local players.

C: Since when have the sales been in decline?

I: Since the past 1 month.

C: Was there a price change?

I: No.

C: Relative to our competitors, has the prices suddenly become more expensive?

I: Maybe, explore what could be the reasons not limited to price change.

C: Explored the entire journey right from supply chain to distributors to warehouses, to retailers and finally the customers. I put forward possible causes such as:

a) under-stocking at stores because of loss of inventory in the supply chain,
b) Possible changes in quality that is making our product less attractive.

I: Up to the point of distribution in stores, there is not any problem. Think of any possible causes beyond that.

C: There can be two possible causes:

a) Changes in product placement in stores,
b) change in promotion policies of our company vs the competitor company.

I: Yes, that is right there has been a change in promotional strategy of competitors. They have started sending goodies like pen stand, wall clock etc. with their logo to the retailers. And that is increasing top of mind awareness both in the minds of retailers and customers who visit their shops.

There are two types of corporate cards: Travel card and Payments card where the latter is used by companies to make payments to their vendors/suppliers. You are the credit card company, and you see that certain clients are not using these credit cards up-to the designated limit. So, for e.g., if the limit is 10000, the client is only utilizing 1000 of it. What kind of data (primary and secondary) can you use to nudge these kinds of companies to utilize their credit card limits and make more payments?
The discussion was for about 40 minutes where I first understood the working of these two credit cards, what kind of information the credit card company tracks about payments made etc.

The interview was more of a discussion and the crux of the solution is that we shall categorize our customers (companies) based on their utilization levels - high, medium, low. Then, we shall compare two or more companies belonging to the same industry but with different utilization levels based on the following parameters:

1) Size of payments made,
2) Number and types of suppliers/vendors to whom the payments are being made,
3) Frequency of payments etc.

Based on mismatch of above parameters (high vs low), we shall nudge the low utilization companies by running targeted advertisements.

Q1. Tell me about yourself.
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Your client is a bank issuing thin file cards that wants to launch them in another geography. How will you go about it?
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate]

C: Asked clarifying questions, Geographical Location? New geography within the country or another country? Objective? More about the product- how are they different from credit cards? Other offerings by the bank? Launch for all the offerings or just thin file cards? Any specific location that the client has already in favor?

I: India, want to expand to some other country, objective was to expand and increase customer base. The card functions like a credit card except for the initial limit offered on a thin file card is quite less which is subsequently improved based on the usage. Mainly launch for only thin file cards. No specific location.

C: I drew the structure which had 4 components and gave a brief overview of each of the element relevant in each component-

a. Country Selection (PESTLE): Political factors, legal factors, technological factors, and economic factors,
b. Industry Analysis (Porter's 5 forces): Competition, Substitutes and Buyers,
c. Market estimation,
d. The logical sequence of events.

I: Reiterated the structure and was convinced with the flow. Asked me to focus on market estimation, what will be the main idea behind the estimation- can US be taken as an example.

C: Gave a brief that the main benefit will be in a country where income is sufficient that people do not opt for loans/ credits and it is thus difficult to ascertain the credit history of the population which will divert them towards thin file cards. A country like US would be the right way to go for it.

I: Was convinced with the reasoning and asked me to go ahead with the structure of the estimation.

C: Went ahead with the standard % division based on the income level with the focus on the upper level and middle-income group of the total population.

I: What excites you about Mastercard?

C: Talked about the focus on the booming payments industry.

Q1. Tell me about your work-experience in brief.
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Q2. Tell me about the POR you hold at IIM L.
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Q1. Estimate the yearly revenue of your favorite restaurant in Cyber Hub, Gurgaon.
Ans. 
The yearly revenue of my favorite restaurant in Cyber Hub, Gurgaon is estimated to be around INR 5 crore.
• The restaurant is located in Cyber Hub, Gurgaon.

• It is a popular dining destination known for its diverse cuisine.

• The restaurant has a seating capacity of 150 people.

• It operates from 12 pm to 11 pm every day.

• The average bill per person is around INR 1500.

• The restaurant is often fully booked during weekends and holida...read more
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You are the consultant of a South Asian Company which provides different cards to companies, however, recently their profits in the travel card vertical are going down. How would you identify the potential clients which we can approach to increase our profits?
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate]

I: Travel card vertical is where they provide travel cards to the companies which distribute it to employees for their daily travels/ trips /business travels. How would you go about identifying potential companies where we can increase our revenues?

C: Talked about Macro factors based on which new trends and insights can be obtained and potential companies can be identified.

I: That's fine and that is for gaining new companies into the portfolio. How would go about identifying the potential companies from the current portfolio?

C: Talked about various aspects like financial insights and on the basis of size, revenue and growth rate of different industries clubbed together.

Q1. Pitch yourself in one minute.
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Q2. Elaborate on a research paper that you have worked on.
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Q3. Tell me about yourself.
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Q4. Why MasterCard?
Ans. 
MasterCard is a leading global payment technology company.
• MasterCard has a strong brand reputation and is recognized globally.

• The company has a wide range of innovative payment solutions for consumers and businesses.

• MasterCard has a strong focus on security and fraud prevention.

• The company has a diverse and talented workforce with a commitment to diversity and inclusion.

• MasterCard has a strong track record of financial
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A low-cost airline has 20% profit margin and 5 million as revenue. Their costs comprise of 2 components: fuel and non-fuel. The fuel component is half of the non-fuel component. Calculate the fuel cost.
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate]

C: Confirms that profit margin is (R-C)/R and proceeds to calculate.

I: Now if the fuel prices are set to increase by 10%, what would be the new profit margin?

C: Calculated.

I: Now can you suggest if the airline should continue operating or shut down because of rise in fuel prices?

C: Explained that since the airlines are still profitable, they should continue to run.

I: Let us look at ways they can increase their profitability.

C: Broke down the whole profitability framework and listed all possible options.

Q1. Tell me something about yourself.
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Q2. Why consulting?
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Q3. Given that you're an Economics graduate, can you explain one related concept to me?
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Q1. Guesstimate the number of iPhones sold in Delhi.
Ans. 
Guesstimate the number of iPhones sold in Delhi.
• Consider the population of Delhi and the market share of iPhones.

• Estimate the percentage of people who can afford iPhones.

• Take into account the average lifespan of an iPhone and the replacement rate.

• Consider the popularity of iPhones among different age groups and professions.

• Factor in the availability of authorized Apple stores and online sales.

• Analyze the sales trends a...read more
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Suppose you're a manager at Panasonic and the sales for the Panasonic hair straightener is falling. State the plausible reasons for the same.
[Please note that I stands for Interviewer and C stands for Candidate] 

C: I stated various marketing, demand, supply, online-offline mode and payment related reasons. I emphasized on credit/debit cards here to make an impression of my understanding of the industry.

I: Follow up questions related with each head and my opinion to overcome them. However, no specific emphasis was given on the card-payment system.

Q1. 1) Sql- write a code to select rope N items from a group 2) Python- explain slicing and indexing with examples, difference between list and array 3) Guestimates and puzzles
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Q1. Discussion on prior work experience and projects on the resume
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