Got 620 in First Attempt need 720+

[A.Shafaat]

Hi friends I got 620 (Q=51, V=23) in my first attempt would you please help me I need 720+? I have bought Manhattan is this enough to make a sufficient progress in my verbal skills

[throughmba]

I know it hurts. But not to worry, it must have been a bad day.

Brace yourself for a brand new fight.

1. If you didn't use Official Guide (OG) for your preparation (and only relied on Princeton), then go and buy it for once. Do not try to get soft-copy or online scanned copies of the OG - just go ahead and get the recent most edition. Practice all questions (quant and verbal) from it, and read the analysis of every question given in the answer explanation. Make sure you understand why a given answer suits the question - do not try to mug up question/answer types. Strategize for every 10 points that you wish to improve on the GMAT, you should study at least 1 hour/week for at least a month. (For example, if you want to obtain a 650, and you are currently scoring a 600, you should study 5 hours a week for a month.)

2. Kaplan's CD is pretty good in terms of giving your brain a workout (my opinion). So that should be the supplement to your OG prep.

3. Which area in verbal do you think you faltered the most at? There are a lot of resources on the Internet (and in paper) that can help you improve your RC / SC / CR scoring rate.

4. Finally,at least 1 month prep is required. If you are working, it may be difficult to regularly take time out of your office schedule. If you are a student, it may be a bit easier. So take week off and put 60 hours for this week.

5. Pinpoint your low areas in verbal

[Amiable Scholar]

Though throughmba have already suggested the right path to follow. Just to boost your moral I too scored exact same score with same breakup in first attempt. I am a software engineer so I got busy with my other professional commitments as It was already late for any school's deadline for my immediate second attempt. so After a gap of 5-6 months I started again .. 2-3 months prep and ended up with
730[Q51|V37]

So Buddy give it a try again, dont loose your heart.

[throughmba]

Re-posting as its very relevant

I think you need to rethink your verbal strategy. Before that you need to look into accuracy and temptation part. solve a mock and answer the following question closely

one big thing to add to your study (this is for anyone who's in about the 80th percentile range and is looking to push into the 90s): analyzing answers.

1) why was the wrong answer so tempting? why did it look like it might be right? (be as explicit as possible; also, now you know this is not a good reason to pick an answer)
2) why was it actually wrong? what specific words indicate that it is wrong and how did I overlook those clues the first time?
3) why did the right answer seem wrong? what made it so tempting to cross off the right answer? why were those things actually okay; what was my error in thinking that they were wrong? (also, now you know that this is not a good reason to eliminate an answer)
4) why was it actually right?

This will help in removing the temptation and bring confidence to solve-guess-solve-guess process.

Be clear on how scoring works? I know you would have read a lot but then you need to taking it up as winning a war rather few battles.

(A) Everyone gets a lot of questions wrong, no matter the scoring level; that's just how the test works. Pretend you're playing tennis. You don't expect to win every point, right? That'd be silly. You just want to win more points than your opponent (the computer)!

(B) Getting an easier question wrong hurts your score more than getting a harder question wrong. In fact, the easier the question, relative to your overall score at that point, the more damage to your score if you get the question wrong. (Note: it is still very possible to get the score you want even if you make mistakes on a few of the easier questions.)

(C) Missing three or four questions in a row hurts your score more, on a per-question basis, than getting the same number of questions wrong but having them interspersed with correct answers. In other words, the effective per-question penalty actually increases as you have more questions wrong in a row. This, of course, is exactly what happens to someone who maintains a negative time position on the test; even if you notice and try to catch up toward the end, you're likely to end up with a string of wrong answers in a row.

(D) The largest penalty of all is reserved for not finishing the test - another possible consequence of maintaining a negative time position.

Know your per-question time constraints
Its like knowing your insulin level. If you dont and if you are diabetic then its going to hurt you in the end/unexpectedly.

Develop a 1 minute sense.

BE confident.