Is 500 a month too much for SEO?

$3,000 a month is reserved for businesses who are truly determined to be ranked among the top websites for a specific keyphrase. Individuals who do not have there heart and soul into there websites and are only in it for the financial gains are not the kind of people I like to work for and thus my track record has proved to be a success (though the financial gains and traffic have increased dramatically.)

SEO is not something you learn overnight. It takes months, if not years to research the art of SEO and even then the search engines may change something in there algorithm thus you must adapt and change with them or face being left behind.