conclusion and future work of online medical store
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Digital marketing is also popularly known as online marketing or internet marketing. Online medicine purchase is popular worldwide due to convenience. Through online website companies sell everything marketing from prescription to other healthcare products. Indian healthcare market is growing at good speed and presently both online and offline pharmacies are doing business. The Indian pharmacy market is huge, estimated by industry to be around Rs 1.2 lakh crore in size and out of that the online pharmacy market, estimated to be a fraction of that at Rs 700-800 crore, is sufferer by regulatory issues that are now showing signs of easing. (Economic Times, 2017) The growths of online companies are imposing huge threat to these offline companies. As a result of this offline pharmacies are united together and on October 2015 the retailers shut their shops as a mark of protest against the online drug retail business. This strike was nationwide and AICOD (All India Organization of Chemists and Druggists) members took participation in it as the Health Minister of India did not assure AICOD against their grievances. The main objection against them is prescription drugs are sold through these online companies without prescription. The sale and distribution of drugs in the country falls under the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945. However , the rules do not distinguish between offline and online sale of drugs. As a result, even after more than seven decades the matter is still debatable. In India mainly two categories of drugs are available a) Prescription drugs b) Nonprescription drugs. The objective of the study is to examine and analyze present scenario-a) of both offline and online pharmacies b) Govt. role in this perspective. The advantages of online pharmacies are privacy, avail great choice, lower prices and convenience mainly. Similarly, the disadvantages include lack of physical evaluation in place, some do not dispense drugs through licensed pharmacies, some online pharmacies do not adequately safeguard patient's health, some do not adequately protect personal and financial information. In USA both online and offline are licensed, however online pharmacies are allowed to operate based on certain restrictions. Indian government must take of patient information privacy and security regarding online pharmacies. They can educate common people about safe practices of purchasing online medicines. They can provide list of approved /accredited online pharmacies in future. No doubt E-Pharmacy improves consumer convenience and access and this will give benefits to elderly patients suffering from chronic ailments because they need to visit pharmacy to buy medicines. At present there is a lot of misunderstanding about e-Pharmacies particularly those are doing offline business in this segment. At present the leading ePharmacy players are-1mg, Netmeds, MChemist, Myra, Medlife etc. Today around 150 startups are currently operating as online pharmacy. India needs an effective regulatory mechanism regarding this aspect. this research focus on the present situation of retail pharmacy sector of India. Pharma retail industry is sensitive zone because it is related to patients' health. Second we have analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of pharma retail industry. Third as no such guidelines are there particularly from Government level. Therefore, Government should look after the matter carefully. Fourth as retail pharma chains are coming out(Offline) and lots of starts up business are already there, therefore how to reach more number of customers, generate revenues and brand development is extremely important and strategy formulations are also vital