How to Unlock More Value From The Sales Resources You Already Have

How to protect margins without compromising growth

Are we in the calm before the storm? CPMs first half performance has been strong, but clients are indicating concern about the impact of geo-political headwinds on inflation and therefore to consumer costs.

In an environment where cost pressures are building and inflation is expected to rise significantly in the second half of 2026, organisations face a critical challenge: how to protect margins without compromising growth. The natural response is going to be look at further cost cutting but as the saying goes you can’t cut your way to growth.

Is there a better way – a way that unlocks more value from the sales resources you already have?

The playbook for better performance and growth

CPM’s Liquid Approach™ is designed to do exactly that – helping clients turn their existing sales resource into a higher-performing, more profitable engine for growth. At the heart of this approach are our category-specific Liquid Approach ™ Playbooks.

These use a strategic, data-led, four-step cycle – Discover, Develop, Deploy and Dissect (see graphic). 

Benchmark your performance gaps and brand potential

In the development phase we produce a ‘Liquid Ladder‘ benchmark of your current position against best-in-class performance, providing a clear view of where you are today, where you could be, and the opportunity that exists between the two.

It evaluates factors such as data usage, resource deployment criteria, organisational integration and approach to commercial modelling. Using both our global and local insight, this creates a robust benchmark that highlights performance gaps and the potential value that can be unlocked.

Strategy to prioritise actions to accelerate growth

We then develop a tailored strategic plan – a practical roadmap that identifies the actions, priorities, interventions and deployment required to close those gaps, unlock untapped potential and accelerate sustainable growth.

This is a perpetual approach for continuous improvement. The action taken and results are then assessed and the cycle begins again to capture the opportunities of a continually evolving market.

ROI improvements up to 40%

As part of our Liquid Approach™, where CPM has carried out this strategic analysis for clients across the FMCG, BWS and consumer electronics categories we have been able to help clients grow their sales by millions of dollars generating ROI improvements of between 20% and 40% and reducing climate impact at the same time. As an example, we generated £22m of incremental sales in 12 months for our UK clients without increasing budgets. 

At a time of intense financial scrutiny this is a better way to extract more value from existing resources.