- Are you not sure about converting your pharmacy website to a mobile pharmacy app?
- Don’t know how to turn your pharmacy website into an app?
- Not confident enough to manage multiple platforms?
- Think that investing in multiplatform mobile app development is highly expensive?
If you have any of those questions in mind, this blog is for you. Let’s find out the answer to make your online pharmacy post-pandemic ready.
Why should you convert the pharmacy website into a mobile app?
The dynamic of doing pharmacy business is changing dramatically with the increasing use of mobile devices. Globally there are 4.32 billion mobile users which means having a mobile app is imperative for the pharmacy business.
However, this is not the only reason why you should invest in pharmacy mobile app development; there are more.
1) Mobile apps are user friendly and improve customer engagement
With the mobile app, you can provide a more interactive user interface to your pharma customers. Though the web design also addresses interactive design issues; the native app has its edge over here.
- Faster and secure
They are faster and more secure than web apps because mobile apps store information locally rather than on the servers making data retrieval smoother and more secure.
- Handy for users
The customer never visits a website regularly while mobile apps have a constant presence.
- Room to add extra features
You can add extra features to your pharmacy app such as GPS tracking to automatically trace the user location, match it with your service area and notify users about the nearest pharmacy shop.
- Mobile camera
The mobile camera can help users to scan medication barcodes and easily upload prescriptions. Moreover, with cameras, they can upload images of defective pharmacy products to easily resolve customer service issues.
- Easy to iterate with other mobile apps
Mobile apps can be easily integrated with other apps such as Apple health to extend pharmacy care services.
2) Best for marketing
Mobile apps are recommended by many experts as they are best from a marketing point of view. Mobile apps reduce your business marketing cost. If you are offering weekly discounts or offers for pharmacy users, pushing notifications to customers who have downloaded your pharmacy app is damn easy.
In the case of the unavailability of medications, you can notify users when the medications are available.
3) Enhance personalization
Individual customers have unique requirements based on their prescriptions, medication buying patterns, and location. Diverse functionalities in the mobile app make it easier to target customers of common choices and deliver a personalized buying experience to individual users.
A mobile app can guarantee a 150% greater conversion rate than a web app with better personalization. Also, it offers you multiple opportunities for brand building.
4) Offline accessibility
Still in many parts of the world internet accessibility is a big problem. Similar to web apps, mobile apps also require an internet connection but some features of the app can be made accessible offline which is not possible in the case of web apps.
For example, pharmacy users can access drug-related information, answers to frequently asked questions, and health awareness content via apps, the information is locally stored on their devices.
Well, now you have many reasons to convert your website into a mobile pharmacy application, let’s explore how you can achieve that.
How can you convert your website into a pharmacy app?
First, have a look into the potential barriers that may restrict you from building the pharmacy application.
- The low investment budget for pharmacy app
- Have limited resources to manage and maintain multiple platforms
- Not getting the proper guidance on how to build a mobile app
If you think developing a mobile app will cost you a lot and your budget will not fit into the app development requirement, you need to rethink. Because you already have a pharmacy website out there it’s now cheaper to build a mobile app from it.
You just need to adjust the user interface according to the different platforms (Android and iOS), and screen sizes.
There are two options that you can choose to build your pharmacy mobile application.
- Native app development
- Multi-Platform app development
In this case, if you want to build a native app for a different platform (Android and iOS) it may cost you more but developing a multiplatform pharmacy application can resolve cost-related issues.
Technologies like Flutter and Kotlin are best for multiplatform mobile app development.
The question of resources can be solved by hiring a dedicated app development company with expertise in healthcare IT solution development.
Steps to convert your Website into the mobile app
- Create a list of required features for your app
Before starting on the mobile app development it’s essential to list out the features you want to see in your mobile app. Also, ensure the listed features are not adding extra complexity to your app and try to limit it only with the necessary features.
Here are a few features that you can add to your mobile pharmacy app:
- GPS to point out the nearest store
- Route navigation for easy pickups of medication from the nearest store
- Notification on the availability of medications, new offers, and deals
- Medication refill reminder
- Scan medication for a refill
- Upload prescription
- Generate medication adherence report
These are just a few, you can add other features according to user needs and business requirements.
- Hire an app development team
To build a high-quality mobile app you need a dedicated app development team that is both knowledgeable in modern mobile development technologies and experienced in pharmacy app development.
Before choosing an app development team you must discuss your plan with the potential solution providers and ask for the multiple pharmacy app development solutions to choose from.
- Create a plan and estimate the development cost
Once you decide on your app development solution provider, discuss your business model and specific needs with them and come up with the implementation plan.
As you come up with the list of features, adding more complex features will only cost you more. Other factors that affect your app development costs are the time frame of app development, the size of the development team, and geographical area.
- Start building your app
The mobile app development includes UI/UX designing, front-end and back-end programming, and third-party API integration. With all these try to make your pharmacy app intuitive so that it can be easy to use for anyone including older people.
Moreover, data security is the prime concern for pharmacy applications so your app must comply with the healthcare regulation and laws.
- Test your app
You should test your application before submitting it on the app store. Try to fix glitches and flaws before your user recognizes them. The best way to do that is by performing the QA and UAT testing.
- Submit your app to Google Play and/or Apple app store
Once your app is ready to launch you can submit it on the android or apple app store. Both the stores will take a few days to review your app, after you get the approval your app is ready to download on the respective app store.
As you know how to create a pharmacy mobile app from a website, just go ahead and claim your territory. There is no doubt that mobile apps give an edge over the website and help you to stay ahead in the competitive market space.
The following is the entire process.

Conclusion:
If you are searching for healthcare-focused app development solution providers you can count on SyS Creations- An Ontario-based healthcare IT company with 7+ years of experience in healthcare IT services.