Some best advices from the success-ers

1. Do not go into the test too overconfident about your baseline verbal or quantitative skills! The GMAT is written with a very particular methodology. Many non-native English students focus solely on the Verbal and lose valuable points on avoidable mistakes in the Quant section. Conversely, students who have grown up in an English environment often do not know the most basic grammar rules, resulting in less than stellar Verbal splits. Be sure to split your GMAT practice time in a balanced manner!
2. Studying for the GMAT should not be an isolated effort! The skills that you learn in Critical Thinking (identifying cause/effect, _____), Sentence Correction (grammar, idioms) can come in handy for the business school application process.
3. Non-native English speakers: DO NOT spend time translating GMAT content into your preferred language! Spend additional time preparing so you can feel comfortable with the question types in the Verbal Section to save valuable time during your actual test.
4. I actually divided my preparation into 3 phases:
   • Phase1 – Get the concepts clear
   • Phase 2 – Practice
   • Phase3 – Test and evaluate
   For Phase 2, I would encourage you to get your hands on as many questions as possible across both the Quant and Verbal sections.
   For Phase 3, write a few tests and evaluate the strong and weak areas. I spent a good amount of time analyzing why I got questions wrong, as well as whether my approach to a right answer could be improved. It is important to repeat the phased approach for the any weak areas until you become confident in your skills.
   I started with the Quant section and went through the MGMAT books. I was fairly confident in Verbal, but after the debacle in my first exam, I started practicing questions regularly in the Verbal section.
5. Get the basic tested concepts clear. I strongly recommend prospective test takers to read a lot (Economist, Time etc..) if you have some time left before the exam.
6. Practice as many questions as you can.
7. No matter how well you prepare you will encounter question types on the actual test that you wouldn’t have seen before. Don’t waste too much time on one question if you get stuck. A rule of thumb: after 2 minutes has elapsed, if you still do not have a way to solve the question and find yourself re-reading the prompt again to make sense of it, just take an educated guess and move on to the next question.
8. Stay motivated by keeping a goal in mind. That could be becoming a VC, getting a 700+ score or getting into the school of your choice. There will be some folks who will point out that it’s a tough goal or its not easy to become a VC and that you should get a reality check. Don’t worry about those opinions. Remember that the ones who made it were not necessarily smarter, but that they worked harder and now its your turn to work hard. Trust yourself and know that you will achieve it.

Source: beatthegmat.com