How much for a SEO expert?

I was just wondering how much it would cost to hire a SEO expert to analysis and consult me on how to promote my site for SEO and better PR. Also, online marketing assitance would be nice.

*This isn't a job offer, I'm just wanting to know what to expect to pay*

The reputed SEO companies are extremely expensive and also the professional SEO is not cheap.I would actually recommend visiting SEOChat forums, or searchenginewatch forums, there you can send your offer by sending PM to few SEO after going through the review.

Consultation sometimes land to tutorials. SEO experts will surely ask for $$$ but there are still many seo out there that can charge you a much cheaper consultation. You just need to evaluate their skills first and if you are going to trust them before you deal with them.

I'll throw my neck on the line and give you what I think would be charged -

For a SEO consultation a decent company would charge about$100 - $150 per hour. You should aim for a company (rather than a single person) to put together and deliever the plan within only a few hours.

I'd say about $300 - $600 for an average size commercial site. It's easy to explain what needs to be done to a site for it to achieve, its implementing the plan that takes time and racks costs up for the SEO company.

I recently charged a client £150 ($265US) for SEO services on 5 pages plus marketing consultation on promoting the website better.

It depends on the amount of work that needs to be done to the site.

Right, you evaluate things after determining what it will entail like your SEO work experience and expertise, the contents, effectiveness and other input require for that particular work.

Personally, We hired a company that promised results and wanted to charge per page they optimize. (we have about 18 000 property and resort pages) So we gave them 10 pages to work with, paid them half and paid them the rest 3 months (+-PR update period) later if the work has proven.

Consultation you'd have to pay for, but the work should be by performance.

I charged at least $700/month for full optimization service with my previous client.
But just like what musik says, It will always depend on the amount of work to be done.