Mastering Digital Real Estate with Brian Harbin

CanadianSME Small Business Magazine

In an exclusive interview with CanadianSME Small Business Magazine, Brian Harbin, Founder of Grit Brokerage and Grit.org, shares his journey from high-stakes sales to becoming a leading expert in domain brokerage. With nearly 400 domain transactions in the past year, including the $3.5 million sale of Ice.com, Brian has mastered the art of negotiation, strategic sales, and business growth. Beyond his brokerage success, Brian is deeply committed to mentoring young leaders, instilling resilience, and fostering entrepreneurship through Grit.org. In this conversation, he delves into the key principles behind his success, the importance of leadership development, and valuable negotiation insights for small and medium-sized business owners looking to thrive in today’s digital economy.

Brian Harbin is a visionary entrepreneur and domain brokerage expert based in Jacksonville, Florida. With over three decades of sales and entrepreneurial experience, Brian has consistently demonstrated resilience, innovation, and a passion for empowering others. He is the founder of Grit Brokerage, a global leader in domain transactions, and Grit.org, an organization dedicated to mentoring young leaders through education and sports. Brian has been featured in major media outlets such as New York Weekly, Tech Times, Benzinga, and International Business Times, highlighting his influence in the domain industry and leadership development.


Brian, you’ve had an impressive journey in entrepreneurship and domain brokerage. Can you share a pivotal moment that shaped your path to founding Grit Brokerage and how it influences your approach to business today?

Thank you, as it’s been a lot of hard work and assembling a great team to get to this point. For me, the pivotal moment for starting Grit Brokerage was a culmination of seeing an opportunity with digital real estate and finding an industry I found fascinating yet unknown, having the skill set and sales experience to be able to make an impact in the domain industry, and being at a place in my personal life and raising a family that allowed me to be able to work from home.  The combination of all of those factors gave me confidence to step into the unknown and bet on myself based on the habits, skill, and mindset I had developed up to that point.


Grit Brokerage has achieved remarkable success, including brokering the $3.5 million sale of Ice.com. What unique strategies or principles have you implemented that set your company apart in the competitive domain brokerage industry?

When I first started brokering domains, the top broker in the industry had a background in car sales, and I knew if he could do it, then I could do it. As a college student, I sold educational books door to door 80+ hours per week and made an average of $40k every summer. I then sold insurance business to business for over a decade so I had amassed tens of thousands of hours in direct sales. When I first entered the domain world, very few (if any) brokers specialized in outbound sales – it’s the hardest, most time consuming and complex sale to make and it was my expertise.  Based on that, I knew my skill set would allow me to be able to fill that need and make a quick splash in the domain industry.


Your work extends beyond domain brokerage to mentoring young leaders through Grit.org. How do you see the connection between your business expertise and your passion for leadership development, particularly in the context of small and medium-sized businesses?

You often hear the importance of CEO’s or top executives having personalized coaching or a mentor. I would take that one step further in saying that to truly be an effective leader, you should always aim to have someone that YOU are mentoring. It helps you refine your systems and be able to explain and show what you do in a duplicatable way. It also brings immense joy helping someone else on their journey based on your perspective and experience. In addition to our summer entrepreneurship internship and summer sports camp, I have 3 boys myself and I’ve coached nearly 50 youth team sports. Helping guide, lead, and instill fundamental life and success principles into the next generation is not just tremendously important but also incredibly rewarding and fulfilling


With nearly 400 domain transactions closed in the past year, you’ve clearly mastered the art of negotiation. What advice would you give to SMB owners looking to improve their negotiation skills, whether for domain acquisitions or general business dealings?

Being a great salesperson and negotiator is about developing good listening skills and asking good questions. To really listen, it’s not just about the words but also the tone, the gestures, the body language, and the style of what they are communicating. Asking good questions is about having an understanding of them on a personal level and what is important to them, and also about really understanding the pain point of what your solution can help resolve for them. Practicing empathy is extremely helpful in negotiation. If you were in their shoes, then what would be important to you? See and study the negotiation from their side. What’s important to them and how would you approach it if you were them? Many times you will find that you are very close to resolving a deal if you can take your or your client’s ego out of the way. Focus on the goal, which is closing the deal and don’t let the deal fall apart for something minor when you are that close to the finish line. If I am in a negotiation with two parties, each with multiple C-levels involved and attorneys, and we are stuck on a relatively small amount of gap, then I help the other party zoom out and realize how much money everyone is spending on the cost of everyone’s time by not closing the deal. A deal can cost tens of thousands of dollars extra just by taking more of everyone’s time when going ahead and closing the deal would be a much cheaper and more efficient use of everyone’s time


As we conclude, what final piece of wisdom would you like to share with aspiring entrepreneurs and small business owners who are looking to make their mark in today’s digital landscape?

We had a saying in the insurance business that if you are green, you are growing; if you are ripe, you are rotten. Meaning that if you are focused on learning and growing as a leader, then your business will continue to grow and prosper. If you stop learning and growing and think you have it all figured out (being ripe), then your business will start to rot and deteriorate. Even with a decade of experience in my industry, I am still constantly learning and growing and trying to improve myself and our company.  

Also, with the world so focused on AI and technology, remember that EVERY business is a people business. Focus on building relationships with your leaders, employees, customers, vendors, and competitors. If you grow as a person and help develop and nurture the people and relationships around you, then the growth of the business will follow. As a leader, be aware of spending as much of your time with PEOPLE as possible.

author avatar
CanadianSME
With an aim to contribute to the development of Canada’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SME’s), Cmarketing Inc is a potential marketing agency and a boutique business management company progressing rapidly in its scope. By acknowledging a firm reliance of the Canadian economy over its SMEs, the agency has resolved to launch a magazine, the pure focus of which will be the furtherance of Canadian SMEs, and to assist their progress with the scheduled token of enlightenment via the magazine’s pertinent content.
Share
Tweet
Pin it
Share
Share
Share
Share
Share
Share
Related Posts
Total
0
Share