Cosimo Chiesa de Negri, president of Barna Consulting Group and Extraordinary Professor of IESE at the University of Navarra, said that "the use of Internet marketing will not replace traditional sales channels in their entirety. According to this expert in commercial management , who gave a course at the Foundation business- University of Navarra, "in the last two or three years, e-commerce is becoming an important alternative channel and its use will grow gradually, but perhaps not at the rates that were encouraged in the first years of its appearance on the market.

On the other hand, he said that the commercial sector is going through "a moment of greater professionalization, in which the salesperson is going from being a simple "product/price" specialist to a true "salesperson/consultant". The IESE business management professor pointed out that " e-commerce will become more important in sectors that do not require a sophisticated salesperson to argue the advantages of a product, such as books, travel, music, etc., but in which it plays an important role," he said. But in those sectors where he plays an important role as a salesman -consultant- it will be very difficult to replace him with the Internet.

The success of marketing through network in some companies "allows us to foresee a promising future for this channel. But other companies have not yet reached the desired profitability thresholds, due to difficult consumer acceptance of this new channel and a high distrust of payment methods and the lack of micro-logistics needed to get orders to arrive on time," he said.

Customer loyalty

Cosimo Chiesa de Negri stated at the University of Navarra that "we live in a totally globalized market in which the offers that a business receives are multiple". This also affects consumers: "They are becoming more and more informed and educated about the product or service they are buying and, at the same time, they are looking for new marketing channels at their disposal all day long: convenience stores subject VIP's, gas stations, etc.". For this reason, "companies nowadays pay more attention to design of their commercial model , to continuously adapt their offer to the needs of a constantly changing consumer".

The successful design of this model is, in his opinion, one of the keys to achieving commercial excellence. He also stressed the importance of good management and motivation of the sales team and an intelligent relationship marketing policy to build customer loyalty. On this last point, he believes that "today it is more difficult to develop a successful loyalty program despite the fact that it is a vital goal for the future of business". Only with creativity, innovation and a higher value offer "can we aspire to be competitive in a globalized and changing market".