This is going to seem like a shameless plug, but it isn't. Rather it's an idea that will cost very little (and far, far less than $250) and that's to test the possibilities with Google's Adwords.
Your Adword will appear on the first page of most search terms without any need to have a PR5+. It's a whole lot cheaper than spending a chunk of hard cash in getting a high page rank via either a handsome fee to
SEO people or a ton of work and experimenting of your own.
For a mere handful of dollars, though, you can very quickly learn how well and often people click on your AdWord and then, it's to be hoped, convert into a sale.
There's been much discussion of Adwords in other threads. As a start, you could do no worse than browsing through the various posts. They're both positive and negative, but they'll at least give you an idea of what you'd be getting into before you spend so much as a single dime!