My journey from 570 to 680 to 720 - Things I did differently

Hi fellow GMATClubbers!

I’m really happy to inform you that I have finally scored a 720 on GMAT after months and months of preparation. I still remember the day when I scored 570 (Q43 and V26) on my first attempt. It was on November 12th 2019 that I scored 570 and exactly after 11 months that is on October 12th 2020, I scored a 720 (Q50 and V38). The journey has not been smooth. There were times when I felt low and times when I even thought of giving up. But I persisted with my prep, hoping to bounce back stronger. And today, when I look back, I feel that all the hard work and struggle has finally paid off. I’m extremely thankful to this community which has provided many insights and kept motivating me with the success stories. I’m sharing my journey below to help other aspirants like me to stay motivated and eventually reach their goal.

Structure of the post

Here’s a quick overview of the post. Feel free to move to the relevant section directly if you want to look at a specific aspect only. I have added some key tips which I learnt from my experience.

• The 1st Attempt – Journey to 570
• The 2nd Attempt – Journey to 680
• What led to a 110 points improvement?
• The Pandemic Derails the preparation
• Sentence Correction Strategy
• Critical Reasoning Strategy
• Reading Comprehension Strategy
• Last GMAT Attempt - Improvement to 720
• Tips for GMAT Aspirants
• Test Taking Strategy

The 1st Attempt – Journey to 570

I started preparing for GMAT in Jan 2019. I took a classroom coaching course. I was relatively new to GMAT and I thought the coaching was decent. The coaching went on for a month and a half and I was taught just the concepts. At that point of time, I thought learning concepts would be enough to score well on GMAT. Once I finished my coaching, I started practicing questions from OG and other materials provided. To be honest, the performance was not very great. I started taking mocks and the score hovered around 550 to 650. I didn’t have a proper study plan and all I did was practice a few random questions daily and take mocks. I finally thought of booking the slot because there was no considerable progress I was making in my prep. It was on November 12th 2019 I gave my first attempt and the result was shocking. I expected a 600 at least but it turned out to be 570. I was devastated and my first thought was will I be able to a 650 at least.

The 2nd attempt – Journey to 680

I took a break for a couple of days and then I started introspecting myself. I felt it is important to know what’s holding me back because only when I know that I can start working on improving my score. When I analyzed my way of preparation, I realized that there was no proper structure. There was no proper study plan and I was just randomly practicing a few questions. I realized that no matter how much effort one puts in, the desired result cannot be achieved unless the preparation is done in the right way.

That’s when I thought of going for an online course. I enquired about a couple of famous online courses. But eventually I went with GMATWhiz which was pretty new to the industry. The course provided a proper study plan which helped me do my preparation in an effective way. The clear weekly task list provided by GMATWhiz helped me to stay focused right till the end. So, I started going through the concepts right from the scratch and I realized that there is a lot to learn and how unstructured my prep was in the first attempt. Earlier I was just focusing on concepts without much attention to the right methods of solving the questions. My approach was very practice heavy. I realized the importance of learning the right methods before jumping into practice.

Important Tip – Don’t practice tons of questions directly. First focus on learning the right methods for each question. That plays a significant role in getting hard questions correct within 2 mins.

To be honest, unlearning my old habits and inculcating the new methodology was not easy. I was used to reading a sentence in a particular way since childhood. So, approaching a sentence from a meaning stand-point seemed weird and took a little more time in the beginning. But I persisted with it because I knew that this is the only way I can improve my score. And whenever I faltered in the process of solving, the detailed solutions provided under every question helped me identify the gap between my approach and the right one.

These GMATWhiz methodologies and strategies helped me solve questions within optimum time. This is something I was struggling with earlier. One thing which impressed me the most was the framework to solve CR questions. That really made life easy! The pre-thinker’s guide helped me pre-think the assumption before jumping into the answer choices.

What changed from the 1st attempt to the 2nd attempt?

For the first attempt	For the second attempt
No proper study plan – Solved few random questions daily	Had proper study plan with clear deadlines – So I knew what to study exactly on a particular day
Learnt the concepts	Learnt the concepts along with the methodology
Practiced a few questions from the materials	Took timed quizzes
Went through vague solutions	Spent significant time on analyzing the solutions and comparing my approach with the right one
Did not have the scope of identifying and working on m weaker areas	The performance analysis provided after every quiz helped me identify my weaker areas and work on them. The improvement modules provided after every quiz are something which helped me a lot to work on my weaker areas.
No guidance	Worked with a mentor who has scored 740 on GMAT. He provided the necessary inputs for my preparation.

Mock Scores

• Jan 11 2020 - 620
• Jan 22 2020 - 650
• Feb 21 2020 - 690
• Feb 26 2020 - 700
• March 1 2020 - 710

The day before the exam, I was really confident about scoring 700+ because I did everything right this time. I did not study anything on the day before the test. Finally, the day has come.

The exam day – March 3rd 2020

I started with Quant first as I always do. The first few questions were decent and I could solve them. But there was a geometry question which I came across. Solving the question was secondary but I struggled to understand the question. I wasted a considerable time there and I realized that there’s no point wasting time on a single question. By the time I finished my quant section, I was sure that I messed it up. I decided that I’ll not let this affect my verbal section.

I carefully solved each question making sure to apply the methodology I learnt. And by the time I finished my verbal section, I was confident that I did pretty well on Verbal. But as I messed up Quant, I was apprehensive about getting a 700 but there was a last ray of hope. But the score turned out be 680. The Quant score was bad as expected – it was 45 and Verbal score was 38. I knew I could have done well on Quant and I’m capable of getting a 700+ score if I get a 49 on Quant.

The Pandemic Hits Globally

So, I thought of giving another attempt in 20 days. I started practicing Quant questions and gave a few mocks. But unfortunately, I could not take my test because of the corona pandemic. This gap had a negative impact as it hampered my momentum. Once I got back to studies after 3 months, I found it very difficult to find that momentum which I had three months ago. I didn’t know where to start because I have already gone through all the concepts. I was not sure whether to practice questions or go through the concepts again. This gap was not in my control.

Important Tip - When you start your preparation for GMAT, make sure you complete it in one-shot. Don’t let gaps come in between as It derails your entire prep.

Getting back on track

Finally, the test centers opened in June. I got back to my studies again. I gave a mock and was surprised to see a score of 600. I convinced myself that it was due to the break. I started revising the concepts and practicing questions. I felt that there was not much to prepare. So, I focused more on giving mocks. The quant score was consistent at 49 but the verbal score kept fluctuating. I thought the mocks were not reliable and went ahead with booking the slot.

The 3rd attempt - 1st July 2020

As usual I started with Quant and this time, I made sure that I don’t spend more than 3 minutes on any question. Once I finished Quant section, I was confident because I could answer most of the questions. But the fate had other plans this time. This time, I struggled with verbal. I got confused between two answer choices for most of the questions. I understood that this time it’s the verbal which will hold my score back. As expected, the score was 680 with 49 on Quant and 34 on Verbal.

I realized that because of the break in studies I have lost touch with the methodologies and I’m not following them in my practice regularly. Probably that V38 in my second attempt made me a little complacent. I was solving SC questions from grammar perspective, CR questions without identifying the conclusion and RC questions without reading in an inferential manner.

Change in Verbal Strategies

I decided to go through the GMATWhiz course strategies once again as that helped me get to a V38 in the first place. So, I refreshed my course and started going through the same process once again following the Concept Booster lessons properly to fine-tune my approach with the methodologies suggested by the portal. I’m detailing out the methods that I followed for each question type this time.

Sentence Correction Strategy

I started approaching SC questions from a meaning stand-point. The most important thing to understand the meaning correctly is to ensure that you pause at the right points and ask the right questions. I made sure that I mentally noted down the subject-verb pairs while reading the sentence and focus on the other pause points that were suggested in the GMATWhiz platform. This process helped me come up with most of the errors even before having a look at the answer choices. With some of the errors pre-identified, I could easily eliminate 2-3 choices in most questions and then plugged the rest of the choices from a meaning standpoint. So, my approach was simple:

• While reading pause at the relevant pause points
• Ask the right questions at each pause point to contextualize the meaning
• Eliminate the answer choices on basis of already identified errors
• Fit the other choices in the original sentence and check the difference in meaning

Critical Reasoning Strategy

I went through the GMATWhiz CR module again and realized that in Critical Reasoning, the most important thing is to understand the Scope of the argument. That in itself is more than 80% of the battle won as Pre-thinking and Answer Choice Elimination is a natural outcome of it. I made sure to identify the premises and conclusion after reading the argument. Once I identified them, I started pre-thinking. Sometimes I struggled to come up with a pre-thought assumption but I made sure to eliminate the out of scope and irrelevant answer choices. Ultimately, I found that I was performing well on CR section.

Another thing that helped me immensely was the Pre-thinker’s Guidelines provided by GMATWhiz. They taught me a unique way of classifying each argument into one of the 4 frameworks and once you do so, it is easy to identify the answer.

• Understand the scope of the argument by clearly identifying the premise and the conclusion
• If the question falls into a framework, use the Pre-thinker’s Guidelines to identify the assumptions
• Otherwise, give yourself 10-15 secs to put your thoughts together on the line of reasoning. If you’re able to come up an assumption it is good, otherwise move to answer choice elimination
• Eliminate each choice by thinking about whether it is inside the scope of the argument or not.

Reading Comprehension Strategy

I really lost touch with RC after the pandemic break. I realized that in my day to day reading I was reading things very differently and that was impacting my performance on RC. I was struggling with timing and to draw inferences. I went through the GMATWhiz concepts again and started reading the passage in an inferential manner. I made sure I made a mental note of every para after reading it and focus on WHY it is written and not just WHAT is written. Whenever I came across the details, I made sure that I didn’t give much attention to them because I knew I can always come back to that particular section if I need any details.

Important Tip – I learnt this big time after making multiple mistakes but remember the most important thing to master RC is to ensure that you focus on WHY the passage is written and not just on WHAT is written.

The MOCK TEST Stage

After finishing all the GMATWhiz modules, I started taking timed quizzes because last time I struggled with timing. I gradually reduced the time limit for every quiz. I noticed that the accuracy was around 75 to 85%. I was satisfied and was confident that I would score well this time. I started taking mocks and the scores were consistent this time around that boosted my confidence.

• Mock 1 – 700 (Q47 and V38)
• Mock 2 – 710 (Q49 and V38)
• Mock 3 – 710 (Q50 and V37)
• Mock 4 – 710 (Q49 and V38)

This time I went through the quant concepts the day before the test because all these days I only focused on verbal. I made sure that my confidence on quant doesn’t turn into over-confidence. And finally the day has some.

Last GMAT Attempt – Improvement to 720

My slot was at 11:30 and I reached there at 11. I started with quant section. The first 5 questions were decent but the next 4 questions were tough. I’m not sure if tough is the actual word but may be I was too lazy to solve them. But I persisted and eventually solved them. And after that I did not struggle with Quant. It went smoothly. Then came the verbal. This time I reminded myself that I got a consistent score in mocks so, there’s no need to be tensed.

I carefully solved each question by making sure that I applied the methodology. I made sure I eliminated the wrong answer choices and selected the right one. At the end of verbal section, I felt that I did pretty well. I had to drag myself for the IR and AWA sections because I knew my score has already been decided and I couldn’t wait to see my score. My heart was pounding while clicking the submit button but I was so happy to see a 720 on the screen. And I was surprised to see a Q50. The verbal score was 38 which was expected.

So, this is how I improved my score from 570 to 720. There were times when I felt low and thought of giving up. I would really like to thank GMATWhiz mentors as they would motivate me to continue. I ensured that I identify the reasons why I wasn’t able to perform as expected. And from my last attempt, you can see that there’s always a way of coming back. I struggled with the first few questions on Quant but I persisted with it and I did not let it affect my next questions. So, even if you mess up a few questions in the beginning or if you mess up your first section, do not get disappointed. You just have to make sure that you give your 100% to every question you solve. And I know there are many students out there who are struggling to improve their score and are even thinking of giving up. But I wish my story will give you a ray of hope of coming back stronger.

Tips for other GMAT Aspirants from my journey

For a beginner

• Understand the structure of GMAT and what is actually tested on it
• Make a proper study plan and make sure to follow it no matter what
• Organize the concepts and start preparing
• Learn the concepts (one topic at a time) and the methodology to solve questions of that topic
• Take quizzes to solidify your understanding for that topic
• Repeat this process for all the topics
• Start taking mocks (Do not take too many)
• Once you get your desired score consistently in a couple of mocks, then you are good to book a slot

For a re-taker

• Take a break for a couple of days and start introspecting
• Identify what went wrong
• Make sure you work on those weaker areas
• Make sure you learn the right methodology because it is the main culprit in most of the cases
• Do not just practice questions without learning the methodology

And this is something which is common for both of them. Make sure you do not take a gap in your preparation. It will have a very serious effect.

Timing Strategy for GMAT

And coming to the timing strategy, make sure you do not spend more than 3 minutes on any question. It is important to identify whether you can solve the particular question under 2 minutes. If it takes more than 2 minutes make sure that you get it right because there’s no point spending 4 or 5 minutes on a single question and ultimately guessing it. You can afford to take a little more time on the initial questions because if you get the initial questions right, you will be served the difficult questions which will take your score to a 700 level. I attached my ESR in which you can see my timing strategy. I was careful with the first few questions on quant and as a result I got them all right and was served difficult questions.

So, no matter how well you prepare, the test-taking strategy places a very important role. GMAT is all about getting your concentration right for 3 and half hours consistently. I hope you find this post helpful. I wish all of you who are preparing for GMAT all the very best. Hope you achieve your dream GMAT score.