I have the same problem with distractions. Usually I blame the book, "Don't want to read this anymore, must be a crap book". My two methods for trying to keep at it are:
1) The Pomodoro Technique
2) If possible bend the exercise to fit my specific goals
On another note (not specific to picking up clients) I found the book www.businessmodelgeneration.com to be really helpful in my business explorations.
Good luck! Look forward to hearing your story! I understand the lure of temptations of making "the next big thing" and have been at critical crossroads many times before. I feel if things happened a little different I would have found myself in a situation similar to yours so I wish you all the best in your adventure.
I've used VTK before. The learning curve is much larger and it's a huge library. But it does have a lot of inbuilt functionality like database access with filters/conversions to format the data the way you need it.
1) The Pomodoro Technique
2) If possible bend the exercise to fit my specific goals
On another note (not specific to picking up clients) I found the book www.businessmodelgeneration.com to be really helpful in my business explorations.