New to GMAT Study Prep: How to Best Prep?

Question

Hi all,

I graduated this past December from Rutgers University, where I majored in finance and minored in economics.

I recently decided I’d like to pursue a Masters in Finance at a top-ranked university. After doing my research, I learned that the majority of these programs require the GMAT and a score of 675+, which takes months to prepare, as I was told. Most of these programs have final application round deadlines some time early/mid-May.

For now, I purchased the official 2022 GMAT guide from Amazon and plan to read that this week and do a practice test this upcoming weekend to see what my strengths and weaknesses are.

• How do I best prep in 2-3 months? 
• What would be an ideal study plan for me?

- Do you guys recommend I do a Kaplan boot camp course (2 months long) and then take the GMAT to increase my chances of obtaining a high score, or should I do another method?

I look forward to your comments/advice. I am beyond worried at the moment and don't want to wait another year to apply to these top programs. I am committed to prepping as hard as possible and am open to any ideas you guys may have. Thank you!

Posted from my mobile device

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi DocHoliday.

The best way to prepare for the GMAT is to master it one topic at a time.

To master a GMAT topic

- first, review the relevant concepts and strategies

- then, do practice questions involving that topic UNTIMED until you're achieving high accuracy

- finally, work on reducing the time per question until you're correctly answering questions involving that topic at test pace

Then, move on to the next topic and do the same thing.

That said, you'll have a clearer understanding of how much you need to accomplish once you take that first practice test. It may be that you have to work on many topics to achieve your score goal, yet it could also be that you need only to brush up on a few.

For more detail on how to master GMAT quant and verbal, see these posts.

How to Increase Your GMAT Quant Score: Top 25 Tips

How to Score High on GMAT Verbal

pintukr · Answer

Forum Quiz on this website provides you with topic-wise questions to practice, along with relevant explanations posted by the Experts.

All the Best.

GmatKnightTutor · Answer

Reading success stories of people with similar timelines/target scores in the Share GMAT Experience subforum may be helpful.

How to score high on the GMAT. Why solving approach is important.

abcheld · Answer

I concur! Forum quiz helps to focus on a topic, or a set of topics.

Additionally, when you go for timed practicing later on, it really helps to get into an "exam" mode, where you need to concentrate for e.g. 60mins without interruptions, such as checking if the answer was correct and if not, why.

Also, if you set yourself some goals, like I want to have 25/30 questions correct every run, it automatically makes every answer count. Which helped me a lot to take every question seriously and thus answering some of them took much longer, as I really wanted to make sure its correct. So it simulates an exam situation quite well imho. It's money well invested!

GMATWhizTeam · Answer

Hi  DocHoliday

The key to score well on GMAT is to do the prep in the right way. A lot of students do not do that properly and as a result struggle with the prep. You can go through this   article   to understand the right way to strategize your prep.

OG may be a great source for solving GMAT like questions, however, it is definitely not the ideal way to prepare in your case. Moreover, you may find that the OG is a good option as a question bank but lacks detailed explanations for you to use for improvement. It’s always better to prepare with a definitive resource to help you learn concepts while formulating a consistent strategy to solve questions before practicing them from the OG. This way, your preparation will be a lot more structured, and the chances of you leaving gaps in your learning will be significantly less. Focus on improving the method you follow to solve questions because that's what stops people from scoring 700+.

I would suggest you to spend some time in analyzing the free trials of the online courses. Do a proper research, know in an out of them and choose the one which suits you the most. Having said that, there are a few parameters which you should keep in mind while evaluating the courses. You can go through this   article   to understand a  few key factors that you should keep in mind while evaluating the online courses .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65n8_LIbPIM

Having said that, you would want to choose an online course which can help you with a study plan. Because if you are clear of what to study on any given day, it makes life easier for you.  But a person who can spend 4 hours a day for studies cannot have the same study plan as a person who can spend just 2 hours a day.  So, the study plan has to be personalized, that is, the study plan has to be according to the number of hours one can dedicate for studies. So, I would suggest you to check out the free trial of GMATWhiz and the personalized study plan it provides. And if you wish to have a detailed discussion regarding the study strategy, you can get in touch with me using the below link.

Click here to schedule a call

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi DocHoliday, I've sent you a PM with some notes and additional questions. GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made, Rich Contact Rich at: Rich.C@empowergmat.com

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi DocHoliday,

In addition to the advice already provided, here is a helpful article you can check out:

The Best Way to Study for the GMAT

egmat · Answer

Hey DocHoliday , The best way to prepare for GMAT in 2-3 months is by following a structured and focused study plan suiting your individual strengths and weaknesses, your time commitments and your target score. Click here to read a blog that will teach you how you can create your own personalized study plan. Since you’re just starting off your preparation, I also wanted to provide some useful tips that will help you get started in a proper manner. Start your journey by establishing a baseline of your current abilities for every individual sub-section of the GMAT. You can do that by taking a mock that presents you the complete picture of where you stand today. You can take one of the SIGma-X mocks in our free trial course . Here is the link for the mock - https://e-gmat.com/sigma-x/ (free of charge). Once you’ve identified your strengths and weaknesses , it’s critical that you build a Personalised Study Plan. This will help you cut down your prep time significantly (by around 40%). You may reach out to us on support@e-gmat.com if you need help with creating a study plan. Learn the right methods of solving questions - GMAT is a test of ability, a lot of students make the mistake of just practicing questions randomly without building the requisite core skills tested by these questions. You must avoid that trap. Once you are aware of your sub-sectional score and you have your study plan in place, start with preparing for one sub-section at a time and follow the below process for every individual sub-section: Stage 1: Learning Concepts and Methodologies This is the phase wherein we learn all the concepts in a sub-section and learn the process of solving the questions in that sub-section. Stage 2: Cementing In this phase, we cement our learnings by first solving medium-difficulty questions and then hard questions. We start with relaxed timing and then progress to standard timing. Standard timing is the speed at which you will be expected to take the actual GMAT. Stage 3: Test Readiness This is the final phase of your prep. This is where you write full-length mocks to determine whether you’re ready for the GMAT or need to work on cementing your individual skills further. Mastering one sub-section at a time entails completing the first two stages for a particular sub-section before moving to the next. Track your progress continuously with the right data points and by using a milestone-driven approach. Before your test, make sure you spend enough time on revising your notes and error logs . Make sure you review all your quizzes and mocks in detail to make sure that you got questions correct for the right reasons. For the incorrect questions or questions where you took excessive time, try to figure the gaps and bridge the gaps. You will need a course that offers you: A strong, adaptive architecture that is able to pinpoint your strengths and weaknesses at a granular level. Extensive lessons and exercises to cover concepts and methodologies to help you develop the right Core Skills . A robust and adaptive testing platform with advanced Data Analytics to help you Cement your core skills in each subsection. A reliable and integrated Mock Test Series that provides you with Enhanced Score Reports , especially since you’ve exhausted most, if not all, of your official mocks and questions. And, finally, dedicated support of Subject Matter and Strategy Experts to monitor your progress and guide you every step of the way. The e-GMAT course offers you all of this in a single place and more! Here are top three factors that differentiate e-GMAT Course from other courses. 4 out of the top 5 GMAT instructors globally are from e-GMAT . We not only provide you with the right resources but also assign you a dedicated mentor who guides and supports you throughout your prep tenure. A quizzing platform with granular level data analytics about your skill set to help you identify and fix all the conceptual gaps / timing / accuracy related issues. How to decide? We understand that choosing the right course for your GMAT preparation can be daunting. And to help you make an informed decision and save invaluable prep time and money, here’s a list of factors that you should consider while choosing a course: Experience the free trial courses – most important step that you need to take so that you can decide which platform works for you. Talk to a Strategy Expert in a free one-to-one session. This will help you address your apprehensions, understand the process that you need to follow, and help you design a personalized strategy for your GMAT journey. Visualize your journey by going through the reviews of students who have used these platforms. Both companies have a YouTube channel as well. You’ll find a lot of reviews there as well. Use them to take a decision. I hope all this information helps you make an informed decision. Some Motivation for You I’m also sharing a few success stories of students who’ve had a similar journey as you: Rida improved by 190 points (GMAT 540 to 730) in just about 50 days with the GMAT Online Course (improved from Q32 to Q49). She leveraged the AI-driven personalized study plan and mentor support to achieve this. Click here to watch her success story. Pritam started his journey with OG and could not improve beyond a certain point. He immediately switched to the GMAT Online course and improved by 200 points in just 3 months. He focused on building conceptual understanding and mastered the right methods to approach questions (He improved from Q42 to Q50 in just a few weeks ). Click here to watch his debrief. I sincerely hope that you find this insightful and motivational. Wishing you luck and success with your GMAT! Best Regards, Mansi

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