Found this recent article talking about 5 different startups and how they raised capital an interesting perspective. One even stumbled into a new business model to help others raise capital. http://www.smarthustle.com/article/how-5-smart-hustlers-found-money-for-their-startups/
I personally started with an eLance membership and took on my first two clients there, while I built up the rest of my collateral to start generating outreach to my professional network and am now mostly generating word of mouth referrals. The nice thing about eLance is that you can take on work that you are skilled at and that helps pay the bills, but isn't directly in line with what your core business does, thus avoiding looking like you are all things to all people and diluting your "what exactly does your company do" messaging.
Hope that helps. Good luck!
