Domain broker invests to the right of the dot with .grit domain application.
Brian Harbin has years of experience selling second level domains through his brokerage. But a recent experience turned him on to the idea of applying for his own top level domain: .grit.
About 18 months ago, he was asked to broker an entire top level domain through his company Grit Brokerage. He successfully brokered .radio, and that experience helped him understand the top level domain business model.
“Through that sales process, I became educated on the numbers and nuances of owning a string and found it to be a very intriguing business model,” Harbin said. “I began speaking with many individual string owners and realized it’s a business venture that ties in extremely well with our expertise.”
It’s not surprising that Harbin settled on .grit. In addition to founding Grit Brokerage, Brian runs a summer sports camp called Grit Camp, an internship program called Grit University, and several other initiatives using the Grit brand.
He thinks grit is one of the most important words in the dictionary.
“Once you know what grit is, you know you need more of it, and it’s a quality that every living organism has to have in order to survive,” he said. “How are you prepared to handle adversity? Grit is that quality, characteristic, DNA, habits, skills, attitude, all wrapped into a perfectly simple and easy-to-remember word.”
With .grit, Harbin hopes to spread the use of grit through domain names.
Harbin understands that launching a top level domain is a challenge. In addition to paying $227,000 to apply, registries need to get distribution and mindshare among registrants.
On his application, Harbin spelled out a seven-prong strategy to market and deploy the domains.
“Although the registrar partnerships will be important, we certainly aren’t going to be relying on shelf space at the registrars to drive our growth,” he said. “We have some very exciting channels to sell domain names that will be extremely unique to our existing skill set, expertise, and audience.”
As of publication time, no other applicant has publicly revealed an application for .grit. ICANN will reveal all applications in October, at which point Harbin will know if it’s full steam ahead or if he will need to win an auction for the domain.
“We hope we can use our war chest to invest in building the business rather than paying an additional auction fee. But if it takes more grit just to get .grit, then I guess that’s fitting.”
Fitting, indeed.
I call dibs on True.grit.
Good luck Brian