Converting screenshot bitmap to byte for a vncviewer returns empty

Question

I am using this function to take screenshot from a specific window or whole desktop, And it works because i am seeing the result with pasting into MSPaint. But i don't want to write the result to a *.bmp or any type of file, I wanted to make a simple vnc client from scratch by sending this bitmap data to a remote server. Can i just send this bitmap directly through socket to the server? Or should i convert it to byte or string first.

static void MyPrintWindow(HWND hWnd)
    {
        RECT rc;
        GetWindowRect(hWnd, &rc);
        const HDC hScreenDC = GetDC(nullptr);
        const HDC hMemoryDC = CreateCompatibleDC(hScreenDC);
        const int width = GetDeviceCaps(hScreenDC, HORZRES);
        const int height = GetDeviceCaps(hScreenDC, VERTRES);
        hBitmap = CreateCompatibleBitmap(hScreenDC, width, height);
        HBITMAP(SelectObject(hMemoryDC, hBitmap));
        BitBlt(hMemoryDC, 0, 0, width, height, hScreenDC, 0, 0, SRCCOPY);

        PrintWindow(hWnd, hMemoryDC, PW_CLIENTONLY);

        OpenClipboard(nullptr);
        EmptyClipboard();
        SetClipboardData(CF_BITMAP, hBitmap);
        CloseClipboard();

        DeleteDC(hMemoryDC);
        DeleteDC(hScreenDC);
    }

This is the HBITMAP to Byte converting function that i tried which returns emtpy byte:

static byte BitmapToByte(HBITMAP bit)
{
    BITMAP bitmap;
    GetObject(bit, sizeof(BITMAP), &bitmap);
    const int size = bitmap.bmHeight*bitmap.bmWidth*bitmap.bmBitsPixel / 8;
    byte lp_bits;
    GetBitmapBits(HBITMAP(bit), size, &lp_bits);

    return lp_bits;
}

Also i have read some open source applications and they use this method but the converting part is too compilcated.

UPDATE: So i found this: c++ how to send Hbitmap over socket and it is close to what i want to do but the solution is incomplete, However i got the idea, Just get the pixels from the bitmap then send those pixels or saving those pixel data to array of bytes then send the data.