Advice You - Internet and Businesses Online

If you are planning to sell products online, you'll need a shopping cart system.

What is a shopping cart system? A shopping cart typically consists of two parts - the catalog and the cart. The catalog allo

According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product

ws the merchant to quickly and easily add new products to the Web site and displays those products to potential customers. The cart allows customers to indicate which items he or she would like to purchase and handle the ch

; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

Examples of combination products may in

eckout process.

How much does a shopping cart system cost? Pricing for shopping cart systems varies widely. The first thing to consider is whether you want to purchase software up front and just pay for ho

lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

sting or pay a monthly fee for the shopping cart. In general if you are not very technically inclined the monthly fee approach is probably best. However, you should be aware that there are a number of open source (free) sho

here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe

pping cart systems available (see below for the list of the main one's). These systems will provider basic cart functionality, but will usually require a program for customization.

Fees for purchasing software range from f

d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

Combination pro

ree to hundreds of thousands of dollars for a completely customized cart. In general, if you decide to go this route plan to spend at least $2,000 - $8,000 for the software and customization.

Fees for the pay as you go app

ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc

roach also range widely. The cheapest are usually around $30 per month for a decent shopping cart system from a major provider. The fees can range up to $10,000 per month for very expensive systems. You can generally budget

easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi

less than $100 per month for a very good shopping cart system that will meet the needs of most small to medium sized online stores.

Who are the major shopping cart providers? It seems that many of the bra

nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically

nd name ecommerce companies have entered the shopping cart provider space. Two of the better entries for small to medium sized stores include Yahoo Merchant Solutions and eBay's Prostore. Fees for these start at about $30-4

and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ

0 per month (check their sites as they often run specials).

At the next level for monthly hosting are a number of companies that offer greater functionality and flexibility at a higher prices. Some of the better companies

ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi

nclude Volusion, GoEcart, and MonsterCommerce. Their fees range about $50 - $500 per month.

In terms of purchasing a shopping cart system, you might want to consider one of the many open source (free) solutions. The most p

ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

Following aspects would a

opular one in this space seems to be osCommerce.

If you want to pay for shopping cart software, you might consider X-cart, ShopSite, and StoreFront. These systems range in price from around $200 - $5,000. Remember, you wil

dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
Which combination prod

l still need to pay a monthly fee for hosting.

What are the factors to consider when choosing a shopping cart? Obviously, price is a major factor when thinking about a shopping cart system, but it should n

cts are meaningful and rational?
Which therapeutic categories to select?
Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
Do combin

ot be the primary factor. Think about the choice as an investment. If you make the right choice, the returns will far outweigh the cost.

Some factors to consider:

1. Does the cart meet your needs? Think about how you want

tions increase the patient compliance?
What would be the developing cost?
How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen

your site to work. Will you have many products in each category for example. If yes, then you will need to think about the cart's ability to handle multiple pages of products. Some simple carts do not do this.

2. Think ab

t?

As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel

out how you will communicate with suppliers and customers. If you are using a drop shipper, many carts cannot automatically send a purchase order e-mail to the supplier when an order is processed. If this functionality is i

ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust

mportant, your choices might be limited (unless you pay for some custom programming).

3. Ease of use. You need to consider ease of use, both from the merchant and the customer perspectives. As a merchant you want a system

y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products

that will allow you to easily add new products and content (hint - look for carts that support importing from a spreadsheet). Look at sites that already use the cart you are considering and see how it handles things like pu

.

As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de

tting items in the cart and checkout.

4. Customizability. You want your site to be unique. So choose a cart that allows for some customization. You should be able to customize the look, but you might also decide you need t

elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

Companies that provide selfless information through particip

o customize the functionality.

Finally, take carts for a test drive. Most of the major cart providers will allow you to play with a demo. Put it through its paces and see how it performs.

tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

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Advice You - Selecting a Good Shopping Cart Provider

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