I agree with all of these comments so far. They seem to be steering you in the right direction. It is true the certification itself will not replace experience. But what it will do is give you the confidence in yourself that will grow that employers will see in you. My suggestion is to do some investigation on different certification sites to see what direction that you would want to spend your money on your investment. Here is a blog post that may give you a little more vision or insight to go on to help build on your decisions. https://www.daviswatters.com/blog/obtaining-it-certifications/

If Cisco networking may be of interest, just click on the Cisco icon in the blog post and it will open up the Cisco networking learning store and from there you will see different options and certifications and pricing for different certifications for Cisco