(I'm ignoring how blatantly AI-written the OP is and assuming good faith that the text accurately represents the actual situation.)

> Here’s the thing: for us, it’s hard to stay motivated supporting free users—especially if you’re bootstrapped.

> Paying customers energize you. Free users don’t.

> Today the project have 500 paying customers, and we’re happy to support them.

1 in 60 seems like a pretty good conversion rate to me from other stories I've heard. And who knows if you actually would have reached 500 paying users if you'd charged from the beginning. After all, your free round produced targeted advertising to an audience of 30,000.