Amazon is an online e-commerce retailer, which sells its products through various online platforms. Among other products, Amazon deals with a range of products such as jewelry, clothing, electronics, machinery, and cosmetics, among others. Over the last decades, Amazon has heavily invested in internet marketing, especially with the introduction of new technology. Various technological applications have been introduced in the e-commerce industry that enables these firms to reach out to their customers online. Nearly 75 percent of the world’s populations are frequent visitors on social media. Therefore, it is imperative to ensure such companies diversify on a variety of products to meet the specific needs of their customers.

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Amazon’s intended entry into the online healthcare market would provide a better avenue and a strategy to capture a broad market for health care products and services. It is also a diversification strategy to avail all the core products to their customers on a single store. The company has a great opportunity in penetrating to this market since it has a more significant global market scale for such products. The advancing technology also provides greater opportunity for market growth and customer satisfaction. This essay focuses on the benefits as well as the challenges that amazon might face as it joins into the online healthcare market.

Question 1: What are the advantages and disadvantages of Amazon entering the new market of online healthcare?
Advantages
Amazon must consider its strengths and the opportunities it has in successfully penetrate the market to gain more benefits and a competitive advantage in the market. In essence, the company has a wide customer base who are active social media/online users. The company has a vast scale of the active population of customers, clients, and stakeholders, providing a useful platform for Amazon to create and develop health solutions for various businesses. It has a diverse market, including customers and partners who provide platforms and networks where the company can create various solution-based products and services to meet the demand for healthcare products and services. It can team up and partner with such companies like Berkshire Hathway as well as JP Morgan.

The partnership between Amazon and Berkshire and the acquisition of PillPark pharmacy provide a significant opportunity for the companies to develop a single healthcare company, which does not operate on a profit-seeking motive and constraints. This partnership will provide not only expansive market for their products but also a vast employee base with varied skills and competencies depending on their gender, experience, and diversities as well. Amazon can further collaborate with various healthcare organizations, medical practitioners, and other care providers to ensure the availability of related health care products and services.

The company is also capable of regulating the prices and probably offers their products, services, and relatively lower prices. The reduced-price scale is possible by the fact that the company has been operating for long and hence can operate on a non-profit basis. The company is likely to benefit from the large pool of customers who flood the online platforms looking for specific products to meet their wants. Amazon can also take advantage of its brand loyalty and introduce healthcare products to its customers. The results would contribute to the expansive growth of the company in terms of sales and profitability. It is also possible to increase/expand the world market for the care products among other services offered by the company. Taking healthcare products online would also help to reduce the cost operations and promote flexibility since the customer will not be forced to move a distance from one store to another, looking for products on their choice. The customers can access these products and services through a press of a button.

Disadvantages
However, the move by Amazon to diversify in transforming the healthcare industry by introducing healthcare products and services into the online marketing platforms has been faced by various challenges. One of the major problems is data security management. The data quality is under threat and high-risk prevalence should the patients have the ability to access database, thus distort information stored therein. Health care products and services is a sensitive field, and hence, it is much regulated by state governments and several agencies. The company must establish the best strategy to balance between the quality and cost of healthcare to ensure that its customers can affordably access their services.

Moreover, the quality of health data is a critical factor to consider. It is imperative to understand that as much as health technology can be used to improved and increase efficiency in the delivery of services; it can also pose security challenges. In addition, there is a problem of a data breach since there is no government or independent regulatory body to direct, protect, and control the use of data by the Amazon.

All these problems demand the necessary attention and resolution for the realization of the company’s goal.
There is a need to have adequate measures to ensure that the quality of data is maintained by ensuring the security of patient data. The security can be achieved rough, such technologies as electronic health records (EHR) among other available for improving the safety of patient’s health records. Most importantly, Amazon should consider the use of blockchain to provide a secure and safe platform for the storage of highly sensitive data. There is also the need to have well-implemented policies that can help to ensure proper control and regulation on the data use.

Question 2: What issues will Amazon have to overcome to become successful in the new market of online healthcare?
The focus will be on the company’s history regarding the healthcare market as well as its ability to acquire experience in the medical field. Furthermore, the company’s alignment with the relevant regulations governing the healthcare market will be considered in a successful attempt to answer the question regarding the various advantages as well as disadvantages of the company’s advancement into the online healthcare.

Amazon needs to focus on the development of various measurements that can be used to help in dealing with the challenges mentioned earlier. The main challenges that the company can face in entering the market would include data security issues, cost, and quality. Amazon should develop efficient Artificial Intelligence technologies for the transformation of healthcare, such as the over-the-counter healthcare products, cost saving, and e-commerce platforms for the various lines of healthcare products. There is a need to establish a balanced system to help the company to maintain healthcare delivery services while ensuring that customers can easily afford and access their products. The analysis of the impact of Amazon’s entrance into the healthcare market and the resulting consequences of the same will also act as a framework of pointing out the various pros and cons of the company’s advancement into the field in question.

Another aspect to be explored is the ability of the company to establish regulations concerning the management of medical data of its prospective clients with regards to personally identifiable information. It is also essential to ensure that the company complies with the regulations and guidance on the management of healthcare services using modern technology. The connection between the healthcare market’s current status in terms of the requirements in the market and the excesses and the company’s incentives as well as constraints is an essential concept to reconnect with the aim of answering the exhibited question.
 

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