What you need to build an e-commerce website: A step-by-step startup checklist (2026)

Short answer: The documents and accounts required to set up an e-commerce site are as follows: tax registration (notification of commencement of business or company incorporation), a domain name and hosting in the business’s name, a merchant agreement with a bank or a licensed payment institution, a corporate shipping agreement, and e-Archive/e-Invoice infrastructure. To these are added legal texts such as distance sales, withdrawal, and KVKK (Turkey’s Personal Data Protection Law), as well as ETBİS registration made via e-Devlet before sales. The document for each step and where it is obtained are in the table below.

What you need to build an e-commerce website starts with sequencing rather than design: first a tax registration identifying who will make the sales, then products and inventory, followed by infrastructure, domain, payments, shipping, invoicing, legal pages, product content, and measurement. The practical answer to “How do you build an e-commerce website?” is to follow these ten steps in the correct order, knowing which document and account each requires.

This guide is a startup checklist prepared for a business beginning online sales from scratch. Each step states what is needed, which document is requested, and who supplies it. Because setup budgets and legislative details are explained item by item in separate guides, they are discussed here in a few sentences with links. Tax and company information comes from Revenue Administration and Ministry of Trade sources, and payment institution information from the Central Bank’s list.

What do you need to build an e-commerce website? A 59-second video guide
Video transcript

What do you need to build an e-commerce website? The work starts with sequencing rather than design; ten steps, from official registration to measurement, are followed in the correct order. First, register who will make the sales and prepare a product and inventory plan. Then select the infrastructure; purchase the domain and hosting in the business’s name. Choose a virtual POS or licensed payment institution for card payments. Set up a shipping agreement and electronic invoicing; prepare legal pages and register with ETBİS before selling. Product content is produced alongside setup: original descriptions, specification tables, and photographs taken under the same lighting. Purchase tracking and Search Console are set up before the first order. The most common mistake is starting with design. The domain is purchased in the business’s name, and the returns text is written after choosing the carrier; update ETBİS registration when payment, shipping, or server providers change. The document table for the ten steps and official sources are on the page. If you get stuck during setup, you can write on WhatsApp. Onur Freelance dot com.

Let us map out the sequence for starting online sales together

A few messages establish which steps are ready and which remain incomplete; a free preliminary assessment is provided when the product type and intended sales channel are shared. The setup proposal is sent the same day.

What do you need to open an e-commerce website? The ten steps at a glance

Opening an e-commerce website requires tax registration, products to sell, a sales platform, a domain and hosting in the business’s name, a payment processing agreement, a shipping agreement, electronic invoicing arrangements, legal texts and ETBİS registration, product content, and measurement accounts. The table below shows the document or account to prepare for each step and where it comes from.

StepRequired document / accountWhere to obtain it and who provides it
1. Tax and company registrationNotification of starting business or company registration, tax identification numberTax office or Digital Tax Office; for a company, MERSİS (Turkey’s central business registry system) and the commercial registry; a certified accountant handles the process
2. Products, supply, inventoryPurchase invoices, product code and barcode list, inventory tableSupplier or manufacturer; the business maintains the table
3. InfrastructureWooCommerce installation, hosted platform subscription, or marketplace seller accountDeveloper, platform provider, or marketplace
4. Domain and hostingDomain registration in the business’s name, hosting account, SSLDomain registrar and hosting provider
5. PaymentMerchant agreement, bank account in the business’s nameBank (virtual POS) or payment institution on the TCMB (Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey) list
6. ShippingBusiness shipping agreement and integration detailsThe carrier’s corporate sales department
7. InvoicingInfrastructure for e-Archive invoices / e-InvoicesGİB (Revenue Administration) portal or a private integrator on GİB’s list; certified accountant
8. Legal pages, ETBİSPre-contract information, contract, returns and KVKK (Turkey’s Personal Data Protection Law) notices; ETBİS (Turkey’s Electronic Commerce Information System) registration, KEP (registered electronic mail) addressLegal counsel; e-Devlet (Turkey’s e-government portal) for ETBİS
9. Product contentDescriptions, photographs, variant informationBusiness, photographer, content writer
10. Measurement and marketingAnalytics, Search Console, and advertising accountsThe business’s own Google and advertising accounts

Order matters because the requirements for building an e-commerce website are not independent, and some steps require the output of the previous one. A payment institution application asks for the business’s tax information, ETBİS notifications list payment and shipping companies, and the returns page is prepared according to the chosen carrier.

Step 1: Sole proprietorship or limited liability company?

At the top of the requirements for selling online is the decision on the tax identity under which sales will be made; the options are usually a sole proprietorship or a limited liability company. Their taxation and bookkeeping methods differ, and this difference is clearly explained in GİB’s Tax guide for taxpayers earning commercial income.

TopicSole proprietorshipLimited liability company
Type of taxIncome taxCorporate income tax (capital company)
BookkeepingBusiness account basis if balance-sheet requirements are not met; the Ledger Declaration System is mandatoryBalance-sheet basis, as for every commercial company
Initial procedureNotification of starting business to the tax officeFormation through MERSİS, registration in the commercial registry
Owner’s incomeBusiness profit is directly treated as commercial incomeDividends distributed to a shareholder are declared separately as income from movable capital

Company formation and amendment procedures are handled electronically through the Ministry of Trade’s MERSİS system. The appropriate structure is determined with a certified accountant according to the number of partners, expected sales volume, whether sales will be made to corporate buyers, and the accounting burden. Whether the business is a merchant or tradesperson also affects whether the website’s contact page displays a MERSİS number or a tax identification number.

Tradesperson exemption for home-produced goods

People who sell products they make by hand at home, without industrial machinery or opening a workplace, may qualify for the tradesperson exemption if they meet the conditions in Article 9 of the Income Tax Law. There is an annual revenue limit for online sales, and exceeding it creates income tax liability from the beginning of the following year.

Products purchased externally for resale fall outside this scope. Current conditions should be checked in GİB’s tradesperson exemption guide.

This section provides general information and is not a legal opinion.

Step 2: Product, supply, and inventory plan

Among the requirements for building an e-commerce website, this is the least technical step but feeds every other decision: before the website is built, clarify which products will be sold, from which suppliers, and under which inventory model; infrastructure and shipping decisions depend on this information. The store structure for a clothing product with variants is completely different from that for a single-format food product.

The information to prepare at this step is:

  • Product list: Stock code, barcode if applicable, purchase and selling prices, weight, and dimensions for each product.
  • Variant structure: Which products have options such as color, size, or weight.
  • Supply model: Whether products will be held in a warehouse, produced to order, or shipped by the supplier.
  • Documentation: Supporting every product sold with a purchase invoice or production record.
  • Inventory tracking: Whether the same inventory will be sold both on the website and in a marketplace.

The last item is often overlooked. If the same product is sold through two channels, stock quantities must be synchronized between them; otherwise, orders are accepted for a sold-out product. The need for synchronization directly affects the infrastructure choice in the next step.

Page contents

What is needed to build an e-commerce site: checklist illustration showing online store, payment, shipping, and document steps

Steps 3 and 4: Infrastructure, domain, and hosting

Infrastructure determines the software on which the store will run; three common routes are building your own website with open-source software such as WooCommerce, renting a subscription-based platform, or beginning sales on a marketplace. A marketplace is a sales channel rather than infrastructure and can operate alongside your own website.

Choosing infrastructure

In the open-source model, code and data reside in the business’s hosting account, in exchange for the need to monitor updates and backups. In the subscription model, the provider carries the technical burden, while design and features remain within the platform’s limits. A comparison of WooCommerce, local hosted platforms, and Shopify in terms of pricing model, code access, and moving data to another platform appears in the choosing e-commerce software article. Documents requested in marketplace seller applications are listed in each platform’s seller center.

Domain and hosting

For a business selling through its own website, choose a domain close to the brand name, short, and easy to pronounce; register it in the business’s own name. For hosting, product images, filtering, and checkout require more resources than an informational website. An SSL certificate is essential for encrypted transmission of card and membership information. Because the server’s country is among the information reported to ETBİS, the hosting choice is also connected to the legal step.

Step 5: Accepting payments — Virtual POS and licensed payment institutions

To accept card payments on the website, either sign a virtual POS agreement with a bank or work with a licensed payment institution; both routes require a bank account in the business’s name and a merchant agreement. In Turkey, payment institutions receive operating authorization from the Central Bank under Law No. 6493.

Whether the institution to be used is authorized is checked in TCMB’s operating payment institutions table. The table also shows which payment services each institution is authorized to provide. Clarify these questions before applying:

  1. Which documents are requested in the application, and how long does approval take?
  2. Is there a ready-made payment module for the chosen infrastructure?
  3. How will installments, cash on delivery, and bank transfers be managed?
  4. How does the process work for refunds and disputed transactions?

Cost factors such as commission and settlement time are not repeated here; these items are covered separately in the setup cost guide.

Steps 6 and 7: Shipping agreement and e-Archive invoices

A business agreement with a carrier is needed for orders to reach customers, and electronic invoicing arrangements are needed to record sales; both must be operational before the first order. These two steps meet on the order screen: when an order is confirmed, the shipment record and invoice are created within the same flow.

Shipping

The business agreement with the carrier also includes integration details enabling shipment records to be created from the website. Free-shipping conditions, cash on delivery, and which carrier will handle returns are decided at this step. The carrier designated for returns is written into the information notice shown to the customer before payment.

e-Archive and e-Invoice

For online sales, invoices are issued electronically; this uses GİB’s portal or one of the private integrators listed on GİB’s e-Document website. Which application must be adopted and on which date varies by taxpayer type and revenue; this decision is made with a certified accountant. Connecting the website to invoicing software removes the burden of manually issuing invoices as order numbers grow.

Let us set up the payment, shipping, and invoicing flow in one go

The chosen payment institution, carrier, and invoicing solution are installed on the website as interconnected components and tested end to end with a test order. Items not yet decided are assessed together in the preliminary meeting.

Step 8: Legal pages and ETBİS registration

Every website selling to consumers online must include contact and transaction guide pages, pre-contract information and a distance sales agreement, withdrawal and returns conditions, a KVKK privacy notice, and a cookie preference panel. Outside the website, registration with ETBİS is completed through e-Devlet before sales begin.

Among the requirements for building an e-commerce website, this is the step that relies most heavily on documentation, and its details are collected in a separate guide. The e-commerce website legal requirements checklist explains individually the law and regulation articles underlying each mandatory page, ETBİS notifications, commercial message consent, and e-Archive rules. Final business-specific texts are clarified with legal counsel, and invoicing matters with a certified accountant.

This section provides general information and is not a legal opinion.

Step 9: Product content and photography

The product page is the only screen where customers decide without being able to hold the product; descriptions and photographs are therefore production work that must be ready before selling begins. Although building the website takes a few weeks, content for hundreds of products can meet the same schedule only if planned.

Information expected on each product page:

  • An original description explaining what the product does and whom it suits
  • An organized table containing dimensions, materials, ingredients, or technical specifications
  • Photographs taken with consistent lighting and backgrounds, showing the product from different angles
  • Shipping time, returns conditions, and usage warnings if applicable

Copying the manufacturer’s text verbatim makes it harder to stand out from other sellers using the same text. How category and product pages appear in search engines continues to be improved after launch; this work falls under e-commerce SEO optimization.

Step 10: Starting measurement and marketing

The final item in the requirements for building an e-commerce website is measurement, and it must be completed before the first order; spending without knowing which channel brings sales leaves the reason for results unclear even when it works. Recording purchases as a separate event in the analytics tool, verifying the website in Search Console, and opening advertising accounts in the business’s name form the basis of this step.

Because organic visibility takes time for a new store, initial sales usually come through advertising, existing customers, or marketplaces. Shopping and search campaigns can be created to appear in product searches; campaign structure and budgeting logic are explained on the Google advertising management page. The advertising budget is paid directly to the advertising platform.

Common practice versus planned setup: Frequent mistakes in the e-commerce startup checklist

The most common mistake is starting design before tax and payment decisions; although the website is ready, sales wait for weeks because of a payment application or tax registration. Other common sequencing mistakes and the correct approach are:

  • Purchasing the domain in the installer’s name: Open registration and hosting in the business’s name from the outset, and keep access credentials with the business.
  • Writing returns text before choosing the carrier: Write the text once the returns carrier is known; otherwise, it must be corrected later.
  • Not updating ETBİS notifications: Update the registration when the payment institution, carrier, or server changes.
  • Leaving product content until the final week: Begin producing photographs and descriptions alongside setup.
  • Setting up measurement after sales: Test purchase tracking before the first campaign.

In common practice, the website is built first, and payment, shipping, and legal steps are added individually as sales approach; in a planned approach, steps are ordered so that each output becomes the next input. Onur Freelance’s e-commerce projects are built with WooCommerce, and the technical side of the checklist is handled within setup: payment and shipping integration, placement of legal pages, SSL, and an SEO foundation. The domain and hosting are opened in the business’s name, and administration panel training is provided at delivery.

Onur Freelance’s e-commerce setups start at 24,000 TL; what is included in the package appears on the e-commerce website development page. Which providers receive recurring expenses outside setup while sales continue, and what determines their amounts, are explained item by item in the e-commerce website setup costs 2026 guide. Tax registration, ETBİS, and the legal content of texts are the business’s own responsibility and are completed with a certified accountant and legal counsel.

Let us build a store ready for its first order together

A brief information meeting is provided for those still researching, a comparison of options for those unsure about infrastructure, and a written proposal and schedule for those ready to begin. Messages receive responses between 9:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m.

How product pages, cart, and checkout steps can be improved after sales begin is covered in the increasing e-commerce website conversions guide.

How to choose a domain and extension suited to the store name is addressed in the choosing a domain guide.

How to build the store step by step with WooCommerce is covered in the building an e-commerce website with WordPress guide.

The annual cost of a .com or .com.tr domain for the store is stated on the domain prices page.

Requirements that differ when selling to dealers and corporate buyers instead of end users are explained in the building a B2B website article.

Before starting sales, those wanting to see the domain, advertising, and payment limitations of free website options can consult the relevant guide.

Related guides

Frequently asked questions

A tax registration is required to make sales; this registration can be opened as a sole proprietorship or a limited liability company. For online sales of handmade products made at home, a tradesperson exemption is possible under conditions set by GİB.

There are two paths: a virtual POS agreement with a bank or a licensed payment institution authorized by the CBRT (Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey). The points to compare are: whether it has a payment module ready for the infrastructure, how installments, cash on delivery, and bank transfer will be managed, the refund and dispute process, and the documents requested in the application. Whether the institution is authorized is checked from the CBRT’s table of active payment institutions.

There is no single correct answer; a sole proprietorship is subject to income tax, a limited liability company to corporate income tax, and their bookkeeping methods differ. The decision is made by assessing the number of partners, expected sales volume, and accounting burden with a certified accountant.

Among the requirements for building an e-commerce website, the main documents are tax registration, a bank account in the business’s name, a merchant agreement with a payment institution or bank, a shipping agreement, and electronic invoicing infrastructure. In addition, legal texts are prepared and ETBİS registration completed before sales begin.

Both enable card payments; the choice depends on application conditions, the availability of a ready-made module for the infrastructure, and needs such as installments. Check whether the payment institution is authorized in TCMB’s table of operating payment institutions.

A business selling through its own website completes ETBİS registration through e-Devlet before starting sales. The registration is updated when reported information such as the payment institution, carrier, or server changes.

It is not mandatory, but an owned website keeps customer data, pricing, and brand appearance under the business’s control. If the marketplace and owned website will operate together, plan inventory synchronization from the outset.

The timeframe varies according to product count, variant structure, and whether product content is ready. After the scope is clarified, the schedule is shared in writing with the proposal.

The starting fee for stores built by Onur Freelance with WooCommerce is 24,000 TL. Expenses paid to providers, such as hosting, shipping, invoicing services, and the payment institution’s share, are not included in this amount; all are explained individually in the cost guide.

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