For them, Facebook means money

Ezazur Rahman Chowdhury started his online business in 2013 selling perfumes and watches. The idea struck him during his post-graduation years in Birmingham, UK, when he was receiving requests from friends and relatives for products of global brands. These items were either not widely available in Bangladesh or could be bought at a lower price abroad.

His customer base was initially limited to a Facebook group that had been expanding ever since its launch with more people showing interest in purchasing products from him.  

Returning home, Ezazur, opened a separate Facebook page, Click'n Shop, to display a wide range of products from baby diapers, toys, shoes and cosmetics to watches. Four years on, he now has more than 11,000 Facebook users following the page, two investors in the business and monthly sales of Tk 8-10 lakh.

A new trend of entrepreneurship among young people like Ezazur is seen emerging with as many as 3 lakh micro entrepreneurs doing business using the social media platform.

Talking to at least a dozen of them, The Daily Star learnt that they source products from different places; some import in bulk with the help of a third party while some make boutique clothes and accessories by hiring skilled hands. The products are then stockpiled in their respective collection points, most of which are in a small corner of the traders' houses. The products are then conveniently delivered at consumers' doorsteps through agents like Pathao, PaperFly and Smart Courierbd.    

There are however no statistics determining the social networking site's share of the country's Tk 1,500 crore e-commerce business at present. But the potential of Facebook business is huge and waiting to be explored, according to a study by social media research organisations We Are Social and Hootsuite.  In April of this year, Dhaka alone boasted 2.2 crore Facebook users, second among the top cities worldwide.

Capitalising on this, a group of Bangladeshis led by Afeef Zaman launched an app -- ShopUp -- more than a year ago to make the management of Facebook shops user-friendly and simple.

At the four day long Digital World 2017 fair this month, the ShopUp team introduced a module added to the platform, which it developed in partnership with Facebook.  The new features will ease delivery of products and help run promotion of products on Facebook through bKash payment.  

Afeef said two-thirds of daily online orders, nearly 15,000-20,000, are placed in small Facebook businesses.   

He said his team is now working with at least 5,000 Facebook entrepreneurs who have average monthly sales of Tk 70,000-Tk 1 lakh.  

Clients are more concentrated in the capital though the businesses deliver products across the country, said Rajib Ahmed, president of e-Commerce Association of Bangladesh (e-CAB).

INCOME GENERATION

Ease of operation, not requiring trade licence and tax identification number, less dependency on capital, low risk, and above all no overhead costs, are the factors encouraging young, educated entrepreneurs to enter the online business, he added.

To draw the attention of the Facebook crowd, even businesses who have brick-and-mortar shops like Aarong or e-commerce websites like Chaldal.com and Rokomari.com, are signing up to the social media platform.

Facebook business can be seen as a means for earning income for the youth especially in light of the worrying picture painted by a British Council sponsored report on graduate unemployment in South Asia in 2015. The report estimated graduate unemployment to be at 47 percent, almost 10 times the national average.

Talking about job opportunities in the capital, Rajib said the city offers few job opportunities for graduates and they can instead easily get into Facebook business with small capital.

WOMEN WORKING FROM HOME

According to Rajib, a majority of online entrepreneurs are women who find it convenient working from home.

One such entrepreneur is Borsa Islam, a mother of two children.

A lawyer, Borsa increasingly became homebound, taking the sole responsibility for rearing her children. Looking for a way to engage herself in income generation, she started a boutique business a year ago using her personal Facebook page and eventually joined a group -- F-Commerce Bangladesh -- and created another page -- Excelente Collections by Borsa Islam --  to promote her clothing line.

Her success is quite visible with a rapidly expanding client base and 7,800 plus followers of her business page in a short period of time. Borsa has now hired two tailors to meet the growing demand for her clothes. 

She says she loves the freedom she enjoys. “It's like a part-time job,” she says, adding that she can decide a convenient time to work.

“It [the Facebook business] is good for newcomers [to business],” says Sara Altaf, another individual who sells designer clothes to clients through Facebook.

It has been her hobby to design clothes for women, she says, which was why she started her own business more than a decade ago on a very small scale at home. She used to sell items to only people in her circle at the beginning.

With Facebook becoming popular, she turned to the site in 2004-05 for continuing and expanding the business. “I was a housewife and could earn my pocket money from the business.”

The business has grown steadily encouraging her to get a trade licence, though not required, and hiring four dedicated tailors.

Around a year ago, she rented a showroom but then shut it down quickly as she found out it was hard to attain sustainability with limited investment.

“There are many hidden costs of a physical business outlet,” Sara says, adding that those aren't a matter of concern for online businesses.

Thirty-four-year-old Ezazur, also working for a non-profit organisation, echoed Sara's opinion.

He, however, feels his Click'n Shop business has reached its limit. He has warehouses in the USA, UK, Malaysia and India to stockpile products before he gets them imported by a third party. 

For showcasing his increasing inventory, offering online payment and tracking facilities, he is now thinking of creating a website. But before doing so, he needs to make the calculations first -- the startup cost and the investment required to keep the website operational.

According to Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission 80 percent of internet users are active on the social networking site, demonstrating the immense business potential of the medium. 

It is only a matter of gaining customers' confidence in the quality of products they purchase online, for which entrepreneurs can get trade licences and tax identification numbers, says Rajib, of e-CAB.

With licences and tax IDs, they can get registered with different business associations like his and get support from members.