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How to Drastically Improve GMAT Score
This article is based on years and years of my own educational experience, plus experience of some high-achievers that I know or interviewed. This method applies not only to GMAT but also to any other test out there. In fact, to any knowledge or skill, you want to learn. I will explain how to drastically improve the GMAT score. You will learn how to increase GMAT score by 200 points or even more.
I have to disappoint you right away – there is no magic trick that will help you score very high on GMAT or any other standardized test without doing any work. It just does not exist yet. You will have to put in some work.
However, I will describe below one of the bullet-proof ways to learn and gradually but inevitably increase your ability to score high on the GMAT test. I will describe how to approach your test preparation. It worked for many test-takers before you.
If you are a genius who already scores 700 without any studying (0.1% of people) – please skip this article because it will not help you. But if you are an ordinary smart person – you may find it useful. Keep reading.
Improve the GMAT Score by 50 points
Let us taking step-by-step before talking about how to increase GMAT score by 200 points. Generally, it is relatively easy to improve the GMAT score by 50 points. Relatively, because you still need to study. Easy, because 50 points increase in GMAT score is distinctly achievable.
Unless, we are talking 50-point increase from 700 and up – then it becomes difficult. The higher your score, the more difficult it becomes to increase it further.
For a 50-point increase in score, all you need to do is to take a paid GMAT course, even online, and just follow their materials and plan very closely. For example, Magoosh offers a 7-days free trial and a 50-point increase guarantee. You can check them out.
Important note! I strongly recommend taking the GMAT test prep at the beginning of your studies. I regretted that I did not when I prepared for GMAT on my own. I made a bunch of mistakes costing me many points. Do not repeat my mistake – take the course first.
Following the GMAT course plan developed by professional instructors by itself may increase your score by 50 points. This is what I call a “passive” way to study. You watch their video lectures; you do what they tell you and you improve your score in the process because you are becoming a better test-taker.
But we want a higher score, right? Let’s move on.
How to Increase GMAT Score by 100 Points
How to increase GMAT score by 100 points without breaking mentally and emotionally. First of all, the lower you start (250-400 score on GMAT), the easier it is to jump up. There are two ways to do it, in my opinion.
You can go over the GMAT prep course ONE MORE TIME and THOROUGHLY. Yes, simply review the course well. You are already familiar with the material so it must be easier now. Read chapters, watch videos, redo assignments, sample tests, etc.
You would be surprised to find out that you have missed quite a bit of the material the first time you went over it. It always works like that because this is how our mind works – in layers. Learning by repetition. Layer after layer of knowledge. Even if you do not improve the score by 100 points, in most cases you will improve score anyway.
If you do not want to review all the lectures, you may want to keep reviewing written materials and keep working on them. Now, that you have gone through the course at least once, you know how to study for GMAT. You learned the techniques and the correct approach.
Now you can purchase an additional book on the internet and work through it. I suggest to do both – review instructional material, and do sample tests. By working extra, you can gradually increase your GMAT score by 100 points totals. It is achievable until score of 700.
How to Increase GMAT Score by 200 Points
How to increase GMAT score by 200 points – that’s is no piece of cake, but also possible. Turn on your mental strength and toughen up.
In a nutshell: Take the GMAT prep course first and learn techniques, then review and self-study using those techniques.
Take the GMAT course first. You can take Magoosh if your current diagnostic GMAT score is low. Magoosh is among the top 5 most popular test prep companies in the world. Magoosh makes courses easy to understand and learn. If your score is already higher than 600, then Magoosh would not hurt it. Or, you may take the PrepScholar GMAT review course – a somewhat more complicated but powerful course.
- If you set your mind on improving score, you can also purchase PrepScholar individual training and tutoring program. They have sample lectures and powerful tutoring and guidance option. It is not cheap, but you will get personal attention from top-rated GMAT instructors or tutors.
- PrepScholar also offers MBA admissions consulting and a few other good programs. Best, they also offer a 60 point increase or money-back guarantee. And 5 days of a free trial. They landed some of their students into top MBA programs at Harvard and Wharton, for example.
- Using any of the two courses above may help to raise your score by 200 points.
- However, if you do not want to take private tutoring, then you will need to spend plenty of time preparing on your own after you take the GMAT prep course.
- Go over video lectures and materials over and over again. Redo assignments, retake sample tests, read explanations – again. I suggest to stick with one set of materials first and go over them at least 2 times – TWICE. Each time you will find something new there, therefore, picking up more and more points as you go.
- Now you may purchase an additional book or CD and work through the next set of materials. Also, try to go over them thoroughly at least twice.
- The whole process can take you anywhere from 6 – 12 months. It is well worth it. All money spent is worth it. You must get into as high-ranking program as possible.
This overall approach may help you to increase GMAT score by 200 points if you stick to study plan.
How to Improve GMAT Score From 600 to 700
The question of how to improve GMAT score from 600 to 700 is not that simple. One may think that this is just a 100-point increase in score. But it is not exactly so.
Because I already mentioned that the higher is your target score the more difficult it becomes to pick up additional points. For example, jumping from 300 to 400 is noticeably easier than raising a score from 600 to 700. This is just how it works.
Is the goal of raising GMAT score from 600 to 700 realistic? Yes, it is. It may take you longer than you think. The length of time to prepare for GMAT depends on many factors, including your natural abilities, your ability to learn, focus, review, repeat, and how much time and energy you are willing to spend.
Well, the PrepScholar course advertises that it raised people’s scores from 650 to 740, for example. Their GMAT course can do it.
For some, it could be done only in 1-2 months. For many others, this increase could take 3 to 6 months overall. Yet, for those who start with a very low GMAT score, this journey may take 12 months or even longer.
The principle of improving the GMAT score from 600 to 700 is similar to what I described above.
Keep working on materials and make sure you review material often because we tend to forget quickly what we learned. Our mind starts erasing information just 24 hours after we first learned it. After one week it erases more than half of the information we learned.
The method to stop it is to go over the material again – a review. This somehow signals the brain that this information is important, and it records it over and over, deeper and deeper into memory.
Initially, it will be very difficult for you to learn all the techniques. But as your learning or ogresses over several months – it will become easier and easier. The first month is the most difficult. Then the second month is the second difficult. And so on. You will get better and better at it. Like learning any knowledge out there.
How to Improve GMAT Score From 500 to 650
If you already scored 500 then gaining another 150 points to 650 is not difficult. In fact, from what I have learned so far, getting to 640-650 is not very hard if you regularly put a steady amount of work into studying for GMAT.
Just follow the approach I explained and you will get there sooner than you may realize. I have seen people go from 500 to 650 in one month – this is not uncommon. Can you do it on your own, just with books? You may. But will be MUCH easier if you take the GMAT course.
How to Improve GMAT Score From 550 to 700
Well, I think this would a repetition to answer questions as to how to improve GMAT score from 550 to 700. As I said, improving from 550 to 600 is not going to be too hard, but not too easy either. You can either take Magoosh or PrepScholar courses and utilize their 50- and 60-point increase guarantee (7 days and 5 days of the free trial offer, respectively). That will make your life a million times easier.
To go from 550 to 700 – read above. You will need to review and keep on working.
If you have a job and can spare more funds – I would recommend taking on private tutoring programs offered by PrepScholar. It would be very helpful to have a top-notch GMAT instructor overseeing your studies and guiding you. This will boost your effort enormously.
Raising GMAT Score From 350 to 700
Increasing the GMAT score from 350 to 700 will be a long journey. Make sure you allocate sufficient time for it. If you never studied for GMAT and got 350 on diagnostic or real test – then you simply need to take the course and then study on your own. You will almost definitely improve your score by 100-200 points. You may eventually get to 700, although with very long hard work.
If you studied for a month or two and still got 350 on GMAT, then you must analyses why this happened. Did you feel bad during the exam? Sick? Sleepy? Or wasted time and did not prepare well enough? Then, it is fixable. But if you studied properly and still got 350 then you may have a problem. You MUST change how you study – change your study methods, because you may be doing something wrong.
Can You Improve GMAT Score 300 Points?
Well, now we are pushing it by asking “can you improve GMAT score 300 points.” But if you have read all the above then you should have your answer. Improving the GMAT score from 300 to 600 is not easy but feasible. Increasing the score from 400 to 700 is more difficult.
Although, doable with plenty of hard work using a combination of paid LSAT course and subsequent tutoring and self-study.
But, increasing score from 500 to 800 is practically impossible because less than 50 people get 800 on GMAT each year in the whole world. I would say that 700 is a good score, 750 is a great score, and 800 is an impossible score.
An increasing score of 300 points takes plenty of time and dedication. I suspect it can take 6 – 12 months of regular study 15-20 hours per week.
Look at the money you spend on paid courses and tutoring not as an expense but as an investment. Because higher scores will land you in a better school and will most likely result in better employment opportunities throughout a career. Because the name of your school will stay on your resume for the rest of your life.
And when sometime in the future you apply for the position of CEO of a decently-sized company, executive recruiter and company board will see the name of your university and immediately assess its rank. Even if they say they do not care about what university you went to, in reality, more often than not they do. It plays a subconscious role – reputation, etc.
Realistic GMAT Score Improvement
Do not set too high expectations. Set reasonable expectations, and meet them. If you exceed them it will be a pleasant surprise. I would say that realistic GMAT score improvement is 100-150 points, as long as the target score is 700 or under.
An increase of 50 points can be achieved simply by taking a prep course. An increase of 100-150 points will require some combination, of course, self-study, and preferably tutoring or guidance.
Do not take this decision lightly – why would you forgo some opportunities just because you feel too lazy to study and invest time, energy, and resources in preparation for GMAT? Sometime in the future, you may regret it and think that you could have done better now when you still have this window of opportunity to do that. I have seen that happened many times.
One time was when a friend of mine, formerly one of the big hedge fund top analysts, regretted he did not try to get into top business school, which prevented him from some executive advancement opportunities.
Why This Method May Work
The method I described in this or another form worked for many people. Although, it may not for some other – this is a very individual situation. The method generally works for me.
Improvement scale may vary among individuals, but the overall approach worked for many test-takers. There are different approaches but this is the one I know worked for me, and other people I know and interviewed.
You may notice that I push some GMAT prep courses. That is because standard tests like GMAT become more complicated each year and it takes a good instructor to teach many tricks and approaches.
I suggest Magoosh – their lectures are easy to digest and the price is fair. I also suggest PrepScholar – their lectures may be more complex but also good. Tutoring is not cheap but very powerful.
The increase in the GMAT score of 50 should be your first goal. Then, the next 50. Go through the course thoroughly. Most likely you will see 50 or higher improvement in the score if you are focusing and do everything they tell you.
After that, if you want to try it more – go over the same very materials from course, and you should see new information which you may have missed before or did not pay attention. This is how our brain works and that is why repeating is the key. Do similar or even the same assignments you already did and you should see another 10-20 improvement in the score.
Only after you squeeze everything from existing materials very well you can move on to other sources, courses or self-study materials. Then repeat the same steps with those – study hard, repeat each section 2-4 times, each set of questions 2-3 times.
At first, things will plateau. Then, you should have a breakthrough in your GMAT score because your brain already has a solid understanding of the foundation. Then you will see another plateau and then another smaller breakthrough. If you hit a plateau it does not mean this is your final score. Repeat.
Do not take long breaks between study sessions! One week is MAXIMUM because our brains begging to erase much of the material from memory after 5-7 days of idle storage. Make sure you keep studying at least 10-15 hours per week.
Final Recommendations
Repletion is key. Each time you go through the same material you will find more insights and depth and will have more insights on your own. This is how our mind operates – in layers, by repletion learning.
If you go over material the 3rd or even 4th time carefully – you will understand even difficult staff. Moreover, if you go through materials 3 times, you will realize that you already know 80%-90% of the material well.
Then you will start feeling good about yourself and that will boost your confidence. But you will realize on your 3rd time that there is still 5%-10% that is new to you. Something that you have missed or did not understand.
And that 5%-10 % of new insights may boost your score another 10-30 points on GMAT (or other tests), and this is BIG. About 50 points the first time. Then 30 points the second time. Then 20 points third time. Roughly speaking, as an example.
That would be 100 points extra in total just by using the method. I am giving a very rough estimation, of course. But that is what I have seen happen in real life. You increase your scores not by 100 points at a time, but each time by 10 points here, 20 points there, 30 points elsewhere.
You BUILD your score step-by-step, by small increases. Do not give up too early and do not sell yourself short. Like in computer games – you do things and earn a few points now and then.
And that is what I learned in test prep and law school exams – each step gets you few more points. It is work and only work, there is no easy way to put knowledge in our minds. But that is how our brains work and let’s make sure you capitalize on that.
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