Building an online business using a non-standard TLD

[cm]

This is something I have zero experience in, so just wondering if we can get a little discussion going on the use of what I would call 'non-standard' TLDs.

Has anyone here invested in this area or launched any longterm projects on such a TLD?

For example .live .tech .mortgage (not it.com) etc

I'm considering moving forward with a new online business that makes use of a 'domain hack' using one of these weird domain extensions.

Having only ever used .UK / .COM/NET/ORG in the past, my main concern is how viable are these extensions over the longterm?

Any horror stories of companies going bust and killing the extension? I vaguely remember there being some weirdness with .eu and Brexit etc.

SEO / Brand / Marketing concerns I'm fine with. It's the aspects that are out of my control such as longterm existance of the TLD.

Thanks!

 

[seemly]

I've not really heard anything related to a TLD being deprecated. The only thing I have heard and read over the years is stories of regret about starting businesses on the non-standard TLDs, and the need to rebrand at a later date, where the rebrand shows a tremendous uptick in traffic/users/revenue.

This uptick could of course be more down to the rebrand itself requiring a decent amount of PR, generating more eyes and traffic.

I think if it can be avoided, it should be.

Use the vanity domain as a redirect to a decent and well recognised TLD.

 

[U1]

I own a tld domain and I would say my experience was initially very poor. Like you I jumped in to purchase it as it was rolled off the tongue very nicely and I had a very specific objective in mind to 'domain hack' and build a quote engine through it but the original registrar (GoDaddy - never again) tried to increase the renewal from c. £200 pa to £2000 pa after year 1!! It is forever marked as a 'premium domain' so was incredibly hard to rehome, I did the rounds and eventually ended up at Google Domains now Squarespace. Ive been told its worth a few but yet to develop it out into anything worthwhile, hopefully I will as annually it costs more to own than all of my other domains combined..

Edit - its a .mortgage domain btw