Hi,

I run a popular community website where members seek/give advice in a
variety of topics. At the moment it has a very dedicated mostly South
Asian audience. I plan to release some new features which  I think can
become quite attractive to a much wider audience (have even migrated
to a higher capacity server in anticipation!).

I have never done any marketing (just programming). I would like your
advice on how best to market the site. My budget is low. For
$1000-$3000 what is the best way to increase traffic and reach a wider
audience? I would like specific advice -- if you do this it will cost
you $X and the result will be *** and will take so much time.
Thank you.

Seriously?
Seriously.
http://services.google.com/marketing/links/US-HA-CMBEIGHT1/

Most bang for the buck.
How many bucks?
As much or as little as you want.
Set a daily spending limit.
Turn it off and on whenever you want.
$5 activation fee.
I told www.virtualceo.com to get it.
They are LOVING it.
They say they have NEVER gotten so many hits.
I use it for www.vbaexpress.com.

Seriously.
I do NOT work for Google...!

Thank you for your advice. Actually, I would like some suggestions
which demand very limited time from me. At the moment, I am swamped
with the technical efforts that I cannot do much of the ad placement
and monitoring which the adwords program might require.

You could set it up in a half hour, turn it on and forget it. You
don't HAVE to monitor it, and the ad placement is EXTREMELY easy. You
just build your ad. Google places it on sites that have relative
content and run Google ads.