Admit Advantage

I would like to share my experiences of working with an admission consulting firm called Admit Advantage. I learned a few important lessons along the way that I hope you'd keep in mind before picking an admission consultant.

To be honest, I was a bit desperate to get into a decent B-school this year, and hence thought that spending additional US$3200 would be a worthwhile investment. While zeroing in on consultants, I was rather confused by the lack of credible reviews available. Hence, I thought that the prudent course of action would be to invest in a consultant who had excellent credentials (school he graduated from, his past experience etc), and also talk to him and see whether I'd like to work with him. Just a side note, in case you dismiss my review as rigged, do PM me and I can send you the official receipt that I got from Admit Advantage.

On my initial call with Kofi, their lead consultant, I was really sold on his credentials, and I decided to work with him. He told me that I would be handed to a some other "primary" consultant and he (Kofi) would act as my "secondary" consultant who would exchange "best practices" with my primary consultant. Since, he assured me that he would be completely involved in the process, I bought into his argument. (Yes, it was pretty stupid of me to buy his argument, but I though that since I would have two people with excellent credentials go through my essays, I decided to sign up with them)

Now, after I paid the fee, my "primary consultant" who again had excellent credentials started guiding me or rather misguiding me. I was ill advised to apply to a freggin 60th ranked school! (I told then that I wanted to be sure that I get into a B-school this year, but I never meant that I would apply to a school that was below what I deserved to go to; I was paying a huge sum of money for their strategic advice, even I knew that I could get in a freggin 60th ranked school!). This not only demotivated me, but it really made me doubt myself. What followed was even more surprising: the team at Admit Advantage asked me to fill out an achievement template and something called as PAT, which is just a fancy name given to the questionnaire that supposedly helps you "dig deeper" and find out those "hidden gems" that make you shine on your essays. I put in my best efforts to fill out these questionnaire and started crafting my essays. After, I sent my initial drafts, my primary consultant got back to me with changes which were directly copy pasted from my PAT- no new ideas at all! (I never expected them to write my essays, but I expected them to tell me what else could I have done better to bolster my essays, rather than just regurgitation the stuff I wrote on those PATs back to me). We exchanged a few drafts, but my consultants added absolutely no value.

Three months into the process, I was seriously fed up: my "primary consultant" was dumb as a doorknob! and my "secondary consultant" did not take any interest in my application. Midway, I decided to sign up with another consultant (Paul from Amerasia), as I really wanted to go to a school this year. This consultant, though quite busy, was much more helpful and helped me strengthen my profile.

At the end, I was happy that I got into three top 20 schools, one partial scholarship, and also at one lowish ranked school with full scholarship (when I was ill adviced to take my chances at a 60th ranked school!). The experience I had with Admit Advantage LLC was horrible- I was frustrated and demotivated during the course I worked with them.

Do PM me if you guys need more detail about my experience.

Regards,

yeah but I think one major problem is time. He has too many clients and you end up in compromising the quality of your essay.

I have been a long time lurker on this form and today i thought I should contribute sth back.. esp if it helps clarify any doubts.

Rao - I dont know where you got your feedback or if you have ever used Alex's service on not. But I used Alex for one of my target school. He is Terrific!!! He knows what he is doing. He helped me come up with some great essays. I was running out of time so I only used him for one school and I wish I could have used him for more schools.

shaselai - The question that you have posted is very generic ... if you do some search on this form you will find some great threads that talk about these services. I have only used Alex so if you want a detailed feedback I would be happy to give you one .. feel free to pm me.

What about taking a writing class in a community college? I would take a one term writing class and make my Business School essays to be my final project. A community college class can go for 500 to 1000 dollars, but hopefully you will come out knowing how to fish.

I had a 1-hour complimentary review with Paul Lanzilotti as well. He is great - allayed my fears about MBA applications, specifically concerning reapplications. More importantly, he is very knowledgeable about the process, very methodical in his approach (he even sent me MBA related essays, documents, readings, etc tailored to my situation and needs!) and friendly on the phone. I have no doubt that he would be a great resource for any potential MBA applicant.

obv there some good consultants out there but for a weird reason I am a face to face fan.....

as i m currently based in london, any recommendations?

I pm'd paul (basic stuff... what i want to do, a short 'profile', etc) but didn't get ar esponse. Should I just email their website (the Amerasia group)?

Alex did get back to me and had some good insight for me. I'll be considering him, though the cost is a bit steep.

Any others I should try?

!	Warning - single post user. High potential for a non-genuine review

I spent a lot of time researching admissions consultants, and actually had the 30-minute intro calls with 4 of them!! I decided if I was going to spend that much $, I should be sure I liked what I was getting. After to speaking with the different consultants, I decided to go with Stacy Blackman Consultants because the woman I spoke to was so helpful and eager to answer my questions. I asked a million stupid questions, and she walked me through the process from beginning to end. She also had reviewed my resume and info before the call so she had a whole detailed breakdown of how she saw my applications going. She also gave me great advice in that first phone call, so even if I had gone with another company, I would have walked away with something! But I did end up going with Stacy Blackman, and ended up loving my consultant. They matched me with her because of her background the similarity to my own, and we really connected. If you are thinking about consultants, call a few and compare, but I think you'll agree with me that Stacy Blackman is a step above the others! Just my 2 cents...

Check out Manya Abroad. I've heard of them through friends, though I have no experience. Princeton Review outsources to them, I think.

Anyone has had experiences with precision essays or Avi Gordon, would you please please mind sending me a PM. It will help me a lot.

Also - do these consulting companies generally spend time on one school at a time or work on multiple simultaneously?

Regardless - a daunting task