The downside of launch-day lifetime deals

To fund early work on my iOS tracker, I offered a $19.99 lifetime pass at launch. Made $1,200 in two days, which was great for initial cash flow.

The downside is that those early buyers became my most active users and requested the most features, but they’ll never pay again. Meanwhile, recurring subscription growth slowed down. Now I’m maintaining the app for my core users without ongoing revenue from them to cover backend costs.

If you offered a lifetime deal at launch, how did you shift toward a sustainable model later?