If you have some budget, why sotn buy a dir submission service from DP memebr/ this case you can save your time and dont need to worry about the reciprocal links. but if you really wana do it yourself and you got time for it just go for it. first choose to submit the site to non-reciprocal dirs. when you finished all of those you can change to be reciprocal and last one is paid dirs.. it will take time but yeah backing from those dirs is worth it.
Just my 2 cents - I think its a good idea, 300 a month is fine. The idea is that you are building backlinks for the robots to crawl and your site will increase in page rank. I have done this and I have seen my page rank increase through this process. I personally use Directory Submitter - it is a fantastic program. Only thing I suggest if you are doing reciprocal links, set up some pages but don't put them all on one page, I usually limit to about 30 links per page. You will probably be able to submit to about 400 directories without needing reciprocal links.
Getting links from webdirectory submission is one of the greates way to get links Don't bother with the webdirectorys ascking for reciprocal (they are crap) concentrate on the free ones only ONE WAY LINKS are bether then reciprocal links atr any time
Pointed out on many other threads, but given the variables with (a) how long it takes the directory owner to approve your link and (b) how long it takes a SE spider to pick it up, I wouldn't worry to much about doing a large number of directory submissions in one go. The links will get picked up in dribs and drabs over time and will look just fine.