How to start an online business in Bangladesh: a step-by-step guide (2026)

Published 7 October 2026 · 6 min read

Many online businesses in Bangladesh begin as a Facebook Page: a few product photos, orders taken in Messenger, and cash collected at the door by a courier. It is a sound way to start, because it costs little and you learn what sells before you spend much on stock. Here is the order to set things up in, from choosing a product to sending the first parcel, with the paperwork as the newspapers reported it and the bKash options as bKash describes them, checked on 7 October 2026.

1. Choose something you can sell again and again

Pick a product you can buy again within a week, that you know well enough to answer questions about, and that survives a courier. Small, light, hard-to-break items cost less to send, because couriers charge by weight, and they come back damaged less often.

Start small. Buy a few pieces of three or four designs, post them, and let the orders tell you which to buy more of. A shop sitting on stock nobody wants has spent its money before it has learned anything.

2. Work out what each order leaves you

Before the first post, write down what one order leaves you: the selling price, less what you paid for the product, less packaging, less any delivery charge you pay yourself, less the courier’s cash on delivery charge, which is 1% with Pathao and Steadfast according to their own pages. Then allow for returns: a parcel that comes back has earned nothing and can still cost a delivery charge.

Say you buy a dress for ৳600, sell it for ৳1,000 with the customer paying for delivery, and spend ৳20 on packaging. The cash on delivery charge is about ৳10, so about ৳370 is left. If one parcel in ten comes back, that one costs you instead, so leave room in the price. Our delivery charge calculator works out the courier’s side for Pathao, Steadfast and RedX.

3. Set up your Facebook Page

Sell from a Page rather than a personal profile, so customers can message the shop and find it by name. Choose a name that is easy to spell and to search for in Bangla and in English; our free Facebook Page name generator suggests some. Add a cover photo that says what you sell; our free cover photo maker cuts one to the right size.

Fill in what customers would otherwise have to ask: your phone number, where you deliver, what delivery costs and how they can pay. Post each product with clear photos, its measurements and its price, so a customer can decide without asking first.

4. The paperwork: trade licence and DBID

A trade licence is issued by the city corporation, pourashava or union parishad where the business is, and is renewed every year, according to OGR Legal’s guide to the licence. A bKash merchant account asks for one, as the next section explains.

The Digital Business Identity, or DBID, is a registration for businesses that sell online, issued free by the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms (RJSC) at dbid.gov.bd. When it opened in 2022, Prothom Alo reported that it applies to businesses run on Facebook too, and that applicants upload a photo, a signature, their national ID card, a contact number and their addresses. The Dhaka Tribune reported that a business with its own website or social media page can get one without a trade licence, and must show the number on that page.

Many applications are turned back. The Financial Express reported in September 2023 that 704 certificates had been issued from 5,349 applications, often refused for inaccurate details or for not giving customers information in Bangla. Fill the form in carefully and put your terms of sale on the Page in Bangla. Rules change, so check dbid.gov.bd and your local office for what applies today.

5. Taking payment: cash on delivery and bKash

Expect to offer cash on delivery. Many customers buying from a Page they do not know yet would rather pay at the door, and the courier collects the cash for you. Our guide to cash on delivery explains how the money reaches you and what it costs.

Keep bKash for advances: the delivery charge from a new customer far away, or the price of something made to order. bKash’s own page says its merchant account asks for a trade licence, and that without one you may open a bKash Personal Retail Account instead. Our guide to the bKash merchant account compares the two.

6. Delivery: open accounts with one or two couriers

Open a merchant account with a courier such as Pathao, Steadfast, RedX, Paperfly or eCourier, and keep a second one in reserve. Their charges, cash on delivery terms and payouts differ, and our guide to courier services compares them from their own pages. Decide your delivery charges inside and outside Dhaka once, and quote the same figure everywhere.

Send parcels quickly. Under the government’s Digital Commerce Operational Guidelines, a seller who has taken an advance payment has to deliver within five days, or within ten when the buyer is in a different city, as the Dhaka Tribune reported in June 2021. A parcel that arrives while the customer still wants it is also less likely to be refused. Put a clear slip on every parcel with the name, phone number, address and amount to collect; our free parcel slip maker prints one.

7. Answer every message quickly

On Facebook the conversation is the shop. Customers ask the price, whether a size is left and what delivery costs, and one who waits too long buys somewhere else. Keep ready answers for the common questions, and confirm every order in writing, with the product, size, total and address, before you book the courier.

Our guide to answering every Facebook Page message covers how to keep up once the orders grow.

8. Keep records from the first order

Write down every order, who has paid, which parcels came back and how much stock is left. A notebook or a spreadsheet is enough at first. It shows which products earn money, which customers refuse parcels and when to buy more, and it makes each courier payment easy to check.

9. Give the shop a website

A Page shows your latest posts; a website shows everything you sell, with prices, sizes and photos in one place, and gives every product a link you can send in a message. It can also be found on Google by people who do not follow your Page yet. Several builders have a free plan, and our guide to free ecommerce website builders shows what each one includes.

Sells Pilot gives a Facebook shop a free website at its own sellspilot.com address, with every product, price and photo, and an assistant that answers your Messenger and Instagram messages from your catalogue, confirms each order with the delivery charge for the customer’s district, and books Steadfast, Pathao or RedX. Your orders, stock and returns are kept from the first day.