At the quality end of the market, there are various firms, including MBA Studio, which provide high value in helping candidates make the best possible application to competitive-admissions business schools.
With reference to the industry as a whole, there are a few key attributes that distinguish MBA Studio:
1. There are no dummy solicitations here; no ‘insight’ guides that give you a taster of what you need to know and then ask for cash; no ‘free’ downloads that lead to cash outlays if you want full value. Every resource on this site is free and does not require your email address or any other information from you.
2. Service prices are transparent and directly available here on the site, so you do not need to sign up or provide your email address or other personal information to know what they are. Transparency also assures you that, while services options are adapted to clients’ needs, and discounted in bulk, there are no special private deals.
3. You get the expert. Many MBA admissions consulting firms have dozens of consultants and adjuncts, and while you pay for the top insight and editing, you may get a part-timer. At MBA Studio you get Avi, from start to finish.
4. There is no hype. MBA Studio is a boutique business that refreshes its client base year after year (much of it by word of mouth) and has no ambitions to grow volumes. So it doesn’t need to over-promise school admission chances to drive new business — to feed its consultant base or marketing overhead or industry ambitions. Avi can either help you or not, and if not he’ll say so.
5. MBA Studio avoids the (selling) game of asserting knowledge of what different schools each ‘look for.’ Why? Actually Avi does have insider experience with a number of the top schools, garnered over many years, and keeps closely up-to-date with what top-tier Adcoms put out and what they say behind the scenes. But he has learned many times over that the best admissions strategy is to focus on the candidate not the school. Of course each candidate must be able to specify attributes, courses, professors, and extra-curricular features of the particular school that enhance his/her purpose (“the fit”) but they should not let any school’s alleged ideal-applicant profile determine their pitch. This is because all schools seek a rich mix of different candidates of all types and backgrounds to achieve class balance and so improve peer-learning.
There is a more-ideal vs. less-ideal applicant in general, but there is no such thing as an ideal applicant for any one school. That’s just marketing hot air. (Also, currents move quickly in at business schools, so claims to past admissions committee experience of “who they are looking for” at any institution is of zero consequence.)