Admissionado Admissions Consulting Reviews

Admissionado works in a very functional and structured way, and it is easy to work with them if you are organized enough. They have a whole team where you are assigned a Consultant to help strengthen your application and profile, and he works with other editors as well. I truly enjoyed working with Kirill since he really brought out the best of me. He inquired deeply into my stories and professional background, bringing to light takeaways that I had not even realized. He understood my personality and my strengths as a human and person, helping me showcase and exemplify these in my essays.

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If you are on the fence about getting a admission consultant just do it- I promise you it will be the best money you have ever spent. Sure, they are helpful to put together essays, but admissionado (and Julia especially) is there step by step of the way with you to answer any questions. This was huge for someone as indecisive as me. Julia was able to share what I could expect, what about my profile shined, and what I should stay focused on. My knowledge about applying to grad school now is night and day different than before I started working with Julia. Pick Julia if you want to get into your dream school, I did!

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I would highly recommend working with the Admissionado team for anyone looking to clean up and refine their MBA essays. My main rep was Seth, and Claudia was always quick to reply to my questions! The specific 1-school essay package is a great deal, and I received many rounds of feedback in a timely fashion. The team helped me uncover stronger ways to convey my story in my own voice. They clarified ways that I could make the essay personal while maintaining the professional nature of the piece. I was accepted to my top choice school, and the team gave me confidence in the essay portion of my application.

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I can’t speak highly enough of my experience working with Karen Doster and the Admissionado team. Let’s be honest, the application process is daunting and exhausting.

For me, the hardest part was getting my story of why an MBA and why now dialed in as I, in my opinion, had a very convoluted path. That is where Karen and Admissionado shined. With a few Skype calls, Karen was able to pull bits and pieces out of me and help weave them into a cogent story that flowed with my goals. It was seriously impressive how well she understood the kind of person I am and what my path has been leading up to business school to help me get my story tightly knit.

Throughout the few months we worked together, we exchanged dozens of emails. Her response time was always lightning quick and her advice was outstanding. What I really liked was that she was honest with her feedback. If something was working, she would give encouragement and help me explore the idea further. More importantly, if something wasn’t working, she would point it out and tell me why it wasn’t working and help me steer the boat in a new direction. I really think that her ability to give candid and honest feedback is such an integral part of the process.

If I had to go through the admission process again I wouldn’t change a thing. Working with Karen and Admissionado brought a ton of clarity, direction, and value to the process. I ended up getting admitted to my top choice -- with a scholarship!

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I was a re-applicant, but my personal and professional circumstances had changed significantly since my first application. In that, I could only go to a top business school which could offer me a scholarship because I had to support my family. What is more, doing that with a not-so-great GMAT (710) was obviously a steep challenge. That is why, I was looking for an admissions consultant that had truly mastered the art of applying, and I am so glad to have stumbled upon Admissionado. I strongly believe that the process they diligently use to build applications (content married with storytelling) is at the heart of their repeated success with applicants. Irrefutably, I would not have made it to a top European program (with 30,000 EUR scholarship) without their help.

My consultant was Stefanie Barlow, and since the very first interaction, she was approachable, patient, attentive to details, and most important, politely honest. Every time I submitted my essay for her review, she painstakingly edited my essays and marked it up with numerous powerful questions, which in turn, triggered the responses that made for outstanding story-telling. That is when I realized how robust (and outcome-oriented) their process of application-building is.

Admissionado is a delight to work with from an administrative perspective, too. Claudia is easily one of the most responsive people I know, and was accommodating to all my requests without much fuss (so common to other all too professional admissions consulting firms). For instance, I had initially paid for their resume editing services, but soon realized that I didn't really need their help on the resume. The team agreed to use my payment towards another package without much back-and-forth because they understand the confusion and stress that most business school students endure during the application process.

Again, I reserve the highest recommendation for the systematic process and the excellent team at Admissionado (special shout out for Stefanie and Claudia, of course). I can confidently say that anyone who diligently follows their process and puts in the required hard work will emerge successful -- regardless of the school she or he may be applying to.

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I was introduced to Admissionado by a friend who worked with them the previous year. My first call was with Stefanie and i instantly felt a great vibe with her.
Their questionnaire was a great 1st step because it forced me to think hard about what i wanted to convey with my essays. Before starting this process i had the misinformation that all they did was "check" the essays for grammatical errors and content but it was so much more!
Stefanie had an astute sense of who i was and what were my best qualities. She dug deep into every single line of my drafts and forced me to chalk out the details and remove all unnecessary fluff. She helped me weave a thoughtful narrative and provided a structure to my words.
Although i had the most communication with Stefanie, Claudia and the rest of the team were always on hand for help. They were swift with their responses no matter the time of the day. I was so satisfied with the essay process i eventually went back for help with my interviews as well.
The best part is, the entire team is really cheering you on and want you to do your best. Stefanie was a much needed motivational boost during the whole application process.

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Admissionado was very helpful as I refined my application. They were able to pair me with a mentor who had a background in the industry I'm interested in. Julia was amazing to work with; she's incredibly encouraging and helped me to identify compelling experiences to highlight in my application as well as build confidence when prepping for my interviews. I highly recommend both the company and Julia.

Other positive feedback I have for the company is that they are excellent at communicating and are highly responsive, and they have many consultants who come from a variety of industries and schools.

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I prefer to work with a Chinese speaking consultant and then Admissionado assigned David Fung. I worked with David Fung on one school’s application. He did a very well comprehensive analysis of my application package and came out with a strategy and helped me identify my strengths to guide me during the application process. He helped me on each element of my application to polish it to stand out. I got into my dream school that I applied to. I don't think that I would have come with an excellent application without his help. I highly recommend their service.

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I came across Admissionado via Poets & Quant--I was looking for a consultant that could offer support for UK/European MBA applications. I'd previously had a free consult with another business, and while the consultant seemed decent and a friend had had success with them, it was clear they couldn't offer a nuanced approach to the UK application scene. As an LBS alum (my top program of choice), Sally Radwan was a perfect fit.

During my initial free consult, Sally immediately offered detailed strategic advice unique to each of the programs I was interested in--this was a stark contrast to the much more generalized advice I'd received previously. I knew right away she would be a perfect fit for my application support.

From our initial consult, I was already tight on time for my applications and was still juggling a heavy GMAT study schedule for a resit of the exam. Sally helped me to come up with a prioritization plan, encouraging me to stagger some of my applications into different rounds. She was fundamental in helping me get through the hefty LBS application in a 2 week period (though not advised if you can avoid it!). Her essay feedback was excellent and helped me to rapidly find the right flow and direction I needed for a compelling application.

For a number of external reasons, I ended up putting my other applications on hold for the following year of application rounds, expecting at that point in time that due to a softer GMAT, I'd need to reapply with a stronger score. To my great surprise I was called to interview at LBS, but then to my shock and horror discovered how intensive LBS' interview process can be! I added interview support with Sally, following which she put me through tough interview mocks that were fundamental to my fluency in both the video and in-person interview portions. She was very direct and honest throughout the process, so I truly understood where I needed to improve.

I was over the moon a few weeks later to hear I'd been admitted as an R3 admit despite my softer GMAT! I really couldn't have done it as well without Sally. She gave me crucial guidance and helped me to develop the polish I needed to put my best foot forward and win a spot in my top choice program! I'm ecstatic to be joining the class this Autumn.

A few points of advice for those considering consulting services. While your consultant may help you to strategize and prioritize your application timeline if you ask, it is very much your responsibility to stick to it. Additionally, I was a little unclear on what kinds of questions I could ask for support on and which parts of the application (e.g. short answer questions) I was entitled to support on with the Junior Delux package. I recommend seeking a little more clarity on this at the start. I believe there were more general/essay content questions I had that I could have asked for help with than I did throughout the process.

Best of luck with your applications! You are in great hands with Sally!

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Inspired by the movie “The Pursuit of Happyness”, I have divided my review of Admissionado into the four different stages of my application journey.
The first stage is called “All in”. Six months back, in November 2018, I appeared for GMAT. After reviewing GMAT Club forums and a few amazing applicant profiles, I was 99% sure I was not going to get into any dream MBA school. It felt like I had everything going against me: I was an older Indian applicant 32+ with around nine years of work experience, a pretty regular finance and strategy resume with no out of the world achievements, and no globe-trotting work experience. Moreover, last year I had applied to a few b-schools only to be dinged by all without any interview. By God’s grace, I came across this very page of Admissionado reviews. Reviewing their website, including the candidate reviews from India and China, impressed me.
The free consultation was a bonus as I wanted someone to assure me that I wanted someone to assure me I had zero chance of getting into a top b-school. To be frank, even the short questionnaire for the free consultation was a bit depressing as, to me, all the questions seemed to emphasize why I shouldn’t apply for MBA. I ended up having a one-hour complimentary call with Claudia. Unexpectedly, she gave me hope by saying that I did have a chance of getting into a top b-school, in spite of the weaknesses in my profile. The fees she quoted represented a steep six months of savings. I had couple of days to accept Claudia’s offer as the R2 deadlines were near. Encouraged by her confidence in me, I decided to take a leap of faith and went “all in” with application.
The second stage of my journey is called “Knowing thyself”. I was introduced to my consultant, Mark Lellouch, who has impressive credentials; for the first time in my life, I was interacting with a Stanford GSB graduate. Admissionado has an exhaustive induction process and I had to fill out a detailed questionnaire. This helps the consultant to learn more about you as a person, your aspirations in life, unique strengths, and unusual talents. I was honest in my responses and, before my first call with Mark, I was afraid that my profile would be chided away by the demi-god from Stanford. To my surprise, Mark was warm and humble and thorough with my profile, and he uncovered strengths that I ought to capitalize on in my application.
Being a finance professional, I was thinking of applying to good b-schools in the U.S., but Mark recommended I apply to London Business School because of my age and years of work experience. Though LBS was not on my radar, I liked their curriculum and institutional thought process. I followed Mark’s advice and started LBS application.
Admissionado gives you structure and ample material to write good essays, but the best part is they don’t spoon feed you, they mentor you through this Journey whereby you discover yourself and your stories, sharing the best of these in your essays. Mark responded promptly to all my queries and reviewed all my essays 5-6 times before the deadline. Even though Admissionado charges extra for 24-hour returns, Mark reviewed my entire application one last time before the deadline on emergency basis without levying any charges. Submitting an MBA application definitely made me wiser about myself and gave me clarity on my strengths and how an MBA from LBS would advance my career and allow me to fulfill my professional aspirations.
The third stage of the journey is called “Rehearsing”. I was elated to be selected for an interview. The stakes increased dramatically as I was just one step away from my dream school, without any guarantee of getting in. Mark made the interview process simple – detailed notes on how to ace the interview round along with likely questions, plus two one-hour sessions for prep and a mock interview. Half of the work was actually done while preparing the application, now it is more about delivery and personality. The detailed interview questionnaire allowed me to assimilate the best stories from my life and work experience. I prepared and rehearsed all the questions and I believe that, without such a questionnaire, the interview prep would have become generic. The mock interview I did with Mark helped raise my confidence and identify areas for improvement. I went into the interview having rehearsed extensively and executed according to plan.
The last part of the application process is called “Happiness and gratitude”. I woke up early on 29th March knowing that the LBS results would be in my inbox. I clicked open the email and forwarded it to Mark and Claudia, still trembling. I couldn’t believe it. Thanks to them, I had gotten an admit, something I never thought possible. I am still short of words to express my gratitude.


Kindly note – the views and opinions expressed above are my own, written out of a feeling of gratitude. I have not received any monetary benefits for writing the same.

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