Hi, I’m Alex! I’ve been working in sales for innovative startups like SoftBank Robotics and large corporations like NBC Universal for years. Now, I work as an industry mentor at Pathrise. I help people land great sales jobs through workshops and 1-on-1 mentorship. Check out my review of The Brooks Group.
- What does The Brooks Group do?
- Who is The Brooks Group for?
- What does The Brooks Group cost?
- Ratings and reviews of The Brooks Group
- Alternatives to The Brooks Group
- How does the The Brooks Group compare to Pathrise?
What does The Brooks Group do?
The Brooks Group is an online sales resource that offers training courses, coaching, and workshops to sales professionals. Their 44-year-old program teaches people the skills they need to land entry level sales jobs, advance their careers, or prepare for a new sales role. They currently offer 6 training courses and workshops on a variety of sales subjects like selling with their signature IMPACT system, account management, sales leadership, and virtual selling. Many of their online courses include 1-on-1 coaching with hands-on (sometimes even gamified) lessons.
Their flagship IMPACT training program teaches students to identify customers, build customer relationships, and find solutions with both open-ended questions and active listening. This patented IMPACT sale system stands for investigate, meet, probe, apply, convince, and tie up. Students apply all the aforementioned steps to find leads and convert them to sales. The curriculum also teaches students to shorten the sales cycle, close faster, develop pre-call strategies, improve virtual positioning, and clarify their goals. In addition to technical selling skills, students improve their virtual communication skills and learn about different buying styles. While the IMPACT system curriculum is always the same, some IMPACT courses are instructor-led while others are self-paced. Courses can also focus on applying the IMPACT system to different sales skills.
Self-paced lessons
The self-paced IMPACT-U program offers 6 months of on-demand access so users can learn whenever they want. Students also get a 6-month supplemental study guide and a formal IMPACT certificate upon graduation. While not instructor-led, students get 1-on-1 coaching with sales experts. Lessons are gamified with lots of animated hands-on exercises and activities.
Instructor-led lessons
Students in the instructor-led IMPACT seminar meet for 6 different live online 2-hour sessions. The curriculum includes personal assessments, skills analysis for professional development, a course workbook for self-study, the Brooks Group’s bestselling book on IMPACT selling, sales tools, and 3-month access to the mobile Qstream app that gamifies lessons and quizzes.
Customer service
The Virtual IMPACT for Customer Service is a customizable training seminar that teaches customer service reps how to wow customers and earn their loyalty. The program includes 6 hours of content, delivered in three separate 2-hour sessions or six different 1-hour sessions. The curriculum covers communication and IMPACT skills to help students build customer relations, improve positioning, retain customers, grow revenue from current customers, increase referrals, handle complaints, and find solutions to just about any customer’s problem.
Account management
Similarly, the strategic account management training program includes four live 2-hour sessions and four weekly follow-up coaching sessions. Current and aspiring account managers learn to build trusted stakeholder relationships, shorten the sales cycle with time management skills, drive more revenue, and increase referrals. In addition to a formal certificate, grads leave the program with plans they can use to generate new selling opportunities in high potential accounts.
Sales leadership
People who take the sales leadership training course learn sales coaching skills to improve their team’s performance. The course meets 3 days per week for a total of eight separate 2-hour sessions. Students participate in live lessons, personal assessments, and hands-on exercises. In addition to receiving a formal certificate, students get 2 sales management guidebooks and a 1-year membership to the Brooks Sales Leadership Forum. The curriculum also gives students toolkits that they can use for effective call evaluations, sales pipeline assessments, coaching action planners, and other tools that they can instantly put to work for their teams.
Virtual selling
Their virtual selling bootcamp workshop meets four times from 3pm to 5pm. Students hone their virtual selling skills through interactive exercises with certified instructors guiding them the whole way. The curriculum focuses on new virtual techniques salespeople need to master in our increasingly remote world, utilizing platforms like Zoom, Teams, WebEx, and Soapbox. Students improve their virtual communication skills as well as learn technical sales strategies to successfully interact with customers and sales teams remotely.
Who is The Brooks Group for?
Current salespeople who want to grow their careers or prepare for a new role could benefit from the Brooks Group’s courses. The program is especially helpful for people seeking online training with lots of gamified exercises, supplemental materials, and coaching.
What does The Brooks Group cost? How much work is involved?
Tuition for the virtual selling with IMPACT course is $1,990. Both the IMPACT for customer service course and the strategic account management course cost $1,195. The sales leadership accelerator costs $3,595. Tuition for IMPACT-U is $595. A free IMPACT-U demo is also available to give prospective students a taste of their gamified learning platform.
There is no formal admissions process. Although the training program is recommended for current salespeople, anyone can enroll in any course.
Ratings and reviews
While the Brooks Group does not have many online reviews, they hold a 4.6/5 star rating on Facebook. Their own website hosts positive testimonials as well. The program is also listed among Selling Power’s Top 20 Sales Training Companies of 2016.
Alternatives to The Brooks Group
If you choose not to enroll in a Brooks Group course, there are a number of alternative bootcamps and resources that can help you launch your career in sales.
- One of the most popular online sales bootcamp is Flockjay. Their 10-week program teaches people the skills they need to launch a career in B2B software sales, with lots of personalized feedback for students. They offer an income share agreement (ISA) so students don’t pay until they land a job. Learn more about Flockjay in our review.
- Students seeking a remote program can also look into Uvaro, a 12-week bootcamp that helps students launch a career in tech sales. Starting at week 4, students can take part in their internship program to put their new sales skills to use as they learn.
- People seeking real work experience can also check out Vendition. Their program teaches sales skills to students looking to find an entry-level account executive position.
- Similarly, SV Academy and Always Hired are sales bootcamps that pair students with companies so they don’t have to pay tuition. However, students who pay upfront do not have to work for a partner company.
- In the same vein, students at Fuel Sales Academy work while learning and actually get paid during the program.
- Merit America is a nonprofit that teaches tech sales and software engineering to people without college degrees.
- Like the Brooks Group’s training, Prehired is a remote program with a self-paced course that helps people launch a career in software sales. If grads don’t land a job after 12 months, they get a full refund.
- People on a budget can also check out Aspireship. Their free bootcamp helps people become account executives at SaaS companies.
- Similarly, Software Sales Gurus offers online courses for aspiring salespeople.
More alternatives
- You can also consider the sales bootcamp Headstart Academy, which is online and self-paced. They also give a job guarantee to students.
- Women who want to learn sales skills quickly can check out TalentMinded Women in Tech Sales Bootcamp, which lasts 5 days.
- The online bootcamp GrowthX Academy teaches courses in sales, business development, product management, UX design, and growth marketing. Their SaaS program is self-paced with 1-on-1 mentoring opportunities.
- Another immersive tech bootcamp is Tradecraft. They offer courses in sales, product design, growth marketing, and more. Their 12-week program is designed for people looking to land a job at a high-growth startup. Similarly, GreenFig teaches courses in marketing and sales.
- You can also consider TechPoint Sales Bootcamp, which has short internship opportunities throughout the course.
- If you want a low-cost online program, consider Udemy. They offer 100,000+ self-paced courses in tech sales, digital marketing, and more. Their courses consist mostly of recorded video lectures. Classes only cost about $10 each and feature lifetime access.
- Students seeking university courses can check out edX. Their learning platform hosts online courses from top universities like Harvard and MIT as well as big tech companies like Microsoft. Learn more about edX in our review.
- Similarly, Coursera offers both free and paid sales courses taught by professors at accredited universities.
- The online learning platform Udacity offers both free and paid courses on a wide variety of tech subjects, including business analytics, digital marketing, and growth product management. Like the Brooks Group’s training, their program is remote and includes lots of self-paced work. Students in their more hands-on “nanodegree” programs work 1-on-1 with both a technical mentor and a career coach as they build portfolio projects. Learn more about Udacity in our review.
How does The Brooks Group compare to Pathrise?
The Brooks Group offers training courses to help salespeople accelerate their careers. While they teach professional and communication skills that students can apply to the job search, their program does not include formal career services. Pathrise is a full service organization that helps people with all phases of their job search. Fellows in our program work 1-on-1 with experienced mentors to optimize their resumes and LinkedIn profiles, build their portfolios, find recruiters, send cold emails, prepare for technical and behavioral interviews, negotiate salaries, and much more.
Our program is flexible, with only 2-4 hours of group sessions per week and 1-on-1s that can be scheduled as needed. The Pathrise income share agreement (ISA) means that fellows don’t pay anything until they land a job they love and start working. We never require upfront payments or deposits.
Pathrise is a career accelerator that has helped 1,000+ students and professionals land their great tech sales jobs. With our tips and guidance, fellows in our program have seen their application responses triple. If you are interested in working with any of our mentors to optimize your job search, join Pathrise.
Apply today.
