Amazon Sales Representative interview questions

Process: First off, from soup-to-nuts, expect to spend 30-40 hours preparing for the process. 1. Initial phone screen w/ manager. Only time there were "typical" sales job questions in the process. Lots of questions on whether I was comfortable with the technology. 2. Second phone screen w/ employee who drilled into my background. "Tell me about a time when you had to do something different...". Dig deeper...and deeper...and deeper. 3. On-site interview. When the recruiter lined that up, they send you a "case study" that you have to build a presentation against. Essentially, it's the cherry email you'd never get from a customer. You have to spend a ton of time learning their technology as they expect their AE's to be able to go deep into the stack without a SA. You have 45 minutes to present to them in a mock sales call. You also need to know the Amazon Leadership Principles and be prepared to talk about how your background meshes. After the presentation, this is where the balance of the day is spent. Put more time into this than you think you need to. This isn't the fluff like it is at most companies. The on-site itself is presenting your case to a room of 6-7 people. After that, you go immediately into 1:1 interviews with each one of them where they are drilling into you and how you line up against the Leadership Principles. These go literally back-to-back and even interview through lunch. The last interview is their "bar raiser". Similar to a stress interview. The guy lacks the professional demeanor that everybody else showed (probably by design) and comes at you hard. It's a brutal process - not bad, but very hard. The only negative I have is they won't give you any feedback either in the process or after. So, you have no idea where you hit the mark and missed. Given the 40 hours you spend on the process, it would be nice to get an idea on what was good and what wasn't.

Interview took place via phone, as I was living at a great distance from the States. The interviewer was very thorough and detailed in her questions, yet made me feel comfortable all the while. Didn't get an offer, even though my experience and skills qualified me for the position. I simply wasn't able to meet the geographical requirements of the position. The interviewer asked me to recontact her once I return stateside.