In 1999, the Princeton Review (my old home) provided two primary ways to help students to prepare for standardized tests such as the SAT, ACT, LSAT, GRE, GMAT, or MCAT: live instruction in small classes or a couple of books one could buy at the local bookstore. Eight years later, when I left the company, the choices had practically multiplied exponentially.

I referenced 1999 because that’s when my team started building Princeton Review’s first online courses. By 2007,  companies  offered up to 10 different books to prepare for a given test, online courses available at prices from free to $1000, shorter live courses at your school as relatively inexpensive as $200 up to retail courses for $1500, one-on-one tutoring for $400 an hour or more, and even prep on mobile devices such as a cell phone! Whew, long sentence.

On the other hand, if you go back only another 20 years to the late 70s, the only test prep available were crap courses usually taught by the most boring, crotchety librarian you can imagine—from some company called Stanley Kaplan. More on that another time!

Anyway, in 2010, the diversification continues: type in your favorite (ha) standardized test in the iTunes search box if you don’t believe me. There are even tutors who charge 25 THOUSAND DOLLARS (don’t worry, I’m not recommending that).

This is all wrong, right? Why did it happen? It’s pretty simple. People obviously will pay for test prep now that much of it actually helps. Test prep was well, boring and meaningless to most through the 1970s. Then Princeton Review came around, so they get most of the credit for initiating the expansion: Founder John Katzman and colleagues pretty quickly took leadership of the SAT prep market by offering cool, interesting teachers and strategy that worked (unlike Kaplan’s at that time). Kaplan eventually got it together, but not before Princeton Review was a strong number 2 in all the graduate and professional markets as well.

From there, test prep exploded once folks started offering these programs that actually respected the customer (and therefore worked). Furthermore, people also have different preferences, schedules, learning styles, budgets, etc. So, technology—and that good old American entrepreneurial spirit—drove the test prep explosion further.

Some people want to prepare alone, in their underwear, in front of a computer, at midnight—rather than in a classroom with that irritating teacher’s pet in the front row. They buy online courses.

Some people have an hour train ride every day and would love to use that time to prep. They now do that on their mobile devices, which we all prefer to them talking on the phone.

And, as I’ve said elsewhere, these approaches, which are often less expensive, can work for you—if they fit the way you stay motivated and will learn.

Sure, some products are better than others. Some services are driven more by hype than by superior results (another future column). But there are innumerable test prep tools and services out there in a variety of formats at all price points. It’s good news.

As I discuss in other posts, the most important decision you can make is not necessarily which test prep company, but rather what tools and approaches to use. 30 years ago you had one or two choices. Today, well, it’s crazy.