Achieving your desired GMAT score is possible with your discipline and effective prep course. Greetings from Thailand! I am Chayathorn, a recent BBA graduate majoring in finance from one of the top business schools in Thailand. My GMAT journey apparently started off when I finished my degree last May (2024). I have been applying for a couple of firms without having a clear direction where I was heading to, but then I realized that my dream was different from other peers. For others, their dream may begin right after their graduation; however, for me, it has ended since then. In other words, I have been living my dream for 20+ years as a student, a knowledge seeker, an enthusiast learner. I would like to extend my dream life, so I decided to pursue Msc Finance soon. And that was when my GMAT journey officially began...
I started browsing online to get familiar with what is the GMAT exam and ended up discouraged by the overwhelming information and tasks to be scheduled. In fact, I have researched once when I was still in my third year hoping that I could study ahead and because of that research I decided to postpone to my future self. Nevertheless, this time I discovered
Target Test Prep, and their reviews were exceptional. Therefore, I decided to take their diagnostic test and tried their free trial version for a week. Accordingly, I fell in love with the prep course and purchased the six-month version of the course (with a flash discount!).
TTP’s prep course’s effectiveness lies in their well-structured curriculum and their supportive features. Firstly, I would like to highlight the scheduling feature and their super detailed curriculum whether it be Quant, Verbal, or DI. As I mentioned, I was overwhelmed by the GMAT exam, but
TTP did everything for me. By simply putting my availability each day in hours and my expected exam date,
TTP broke down their flexible curriculum into daily manageable tasks for me. At first, I began reading for two hours each day to test my tolerance rate. It turned out that, with each
TTP’s subunit lessons and practice exercises, I enjoyed preparing for the GMAT and therefore extended my daily availability to around three hours per day (1.5 hours each in the morning and in the evening), with fewer hours on weekends.
My study phases could be categorized into two phases: study phase and exam practice phase. For the former, I have been repeatedly followed by a 3-hour plan each day, building up my knowledge block by block via the so-called Must-Know points. By building up my understanding step by step, I could connect each Must-Know point within and across concepts, further forming a solid foundation for future exam practice rather than just throwing myself arbitrarily into each concept and trying to figure out myself. Moreover, I would usually spend my weekends on reviewing and mastering each Must-Know point to retain my learning throughout the journey. Over time, I found out that I have been solving each question more systematically, which I believe is aligned with the goal of the exam: to test your logical flow via the language of English and Math. This could be mainly attributable to how
TTP assisted me on building each Must-Know point; understanding each constituent would eventually bring me to mastering the whole. For instance, for my Verbal Section practice,
TTP always urged me to categorize each question into their category and to practice as if every answer choice were the question that you had to decipher why it was correct or incorrect.
Nonetheless, my GMAT journey was not always filled with excitement to learn. There were times where I was less motivated and distracted by other priorities. Thanks to the daily motivational quotes and video tips that helped keep my discipline going. I still recall that there was a video tip mentioning that ‘your passion each day could be volatile, and therefore you must nourish your discipline instead’. This translated to me habitualizing my GMAT’s daily studies to the point that one day I realized that if I have not completed this, I would feel frustrated the entire day without any reasons. In other words, I believed the aforementioned features of the course prep were on purpose and extremely impactful.
Days after days of preparation, I finally reached my exam practice phase during the Christmas season ahahahahaa! I decided to practice through the official GMAT’s practice exams (including the ones you have to purchase) as advised by the
TTP. I found official practice exams most beneficial after I had built a strong foundation, as they helped reinforce my test-day readiness. Anyway, when doing the practice exams, my best takeaway is to be honest to yourself. To put it another way, you have to conduct the exam with the same conditions you expect to undergo on the real exam date. This includes taking the exam in one setting and in a quiet atmosphere, as well as having similar equipment (laminated scratch pads and pens) if possible. Fun fact! I could not find laminated scratch pads in my vicinity, so I decided to use A4 whiteboards instead, which are kind of interchangeable for me. After I had completed each practice exam, I would then diagnose my strengths and weaknesses (usually anxiety and time management) and go back to each pertinent Must-Know point.
And the D-Day has come! I took my first GMAT exam (but not the last one) in January (2025). My score was 665 (around 93th percentile), which was astonishingly good. Nevertheless, my guts told me that I could improve my score, and this was just my first GMAT, so I should give it another try. Coincidentally, the video tip on my
TTP course was about whether to take the second exam (see! How powerful the video tip is!). During the GMAT waiting period of 16 days, I followed the video tip about learning from my first exam’s potential mistakes. Finally, I took my second GMAT exam and got 695 (98th percentile)! One thing worth mentioning here would be that I felt time management was my biggest challenge, but I made sure to stay focused and not let it affect my confidence throughout the test. I tried to focus on what I was doing during the exam and ignored what I did wrong or mismanaged. That is probably my last key takeaway for this long debrief: focus on what you are doing, stay sharp, and let’s excel on the GMAT!
Nov 22
Nov 25
28 Feb 2025, 07:09
- 83 percentile. 
