[Help] Aspiring PE/VC analyst/associate - coming from an ECM background

Hey All,
Hope everyone is having a great day. Without making my story too long, I'm someone who's worked in an ECM role for the past year and am looking to make a change at some point in the not-too-distant future. I've been passionate about the PE/VC space for years now and I'm more than willing to do whatever is necessary in order to land my foot in the door. I've written my CFA level 1 exam, and was wondering if this would be a value-add moving forward - especially considering the heavy public market focus. I'm worried that prospective firms will worry about my limited valuation experience so I'm planning to build a paper LBO with an exit strategy to show that I know the fundamentals surrounding private equity. I've definitely considered moving into coverage groups but my firm is far too small and I don't think they're looking to hire in that realm. I can definitely look elsewhere for experience but I'm hoping I can pay my dues here for however long I need to and make the jump. It'd be great if anyone could tell me what I could do to set myself apart and to show that I have the valuation skills/experience necessary. I'm planning on starting my networking journey via reaching out and trying to arrange a coffee with VP's (as everyone does) at prospective firms and going from there.
Note: Another thing I may have going for me is I'm working on a side project/business which should launch in the not too distant future and it might be a nice thing to bring up in an interview at a PE/VC firm.

EDIT: I'm not sure if this is valuable at all - but I've had direct experience with pitching to clients/prospective investors as well as have had face to face discussions with management teams to get a better idea of their strategy.