Anthony Carlton

Founder @ CRE Digital | Helping commercial real estate funds raise capital with premium branding and investor acquisition systems

I built my personal brand to escape the corporate grind.

After working with clients across finance, private equity, venture, and real estate—I doubled down on one clear problem:

Most CRE firms struggle to raise capital online.

That’s why I founded CRE Digital — a content and brand strategy partner for capital raisers, fund managers, and private equity firms.

We turn your expertise into influence, using systems that drive:

• Brand authority that builds trust
• LP investor leads and committed capital
• Off-market deal flow and JV partners
• Speaking invites and top CRE podcast features

What sets us apart? 

We’ve sat on both sides of the table — advising high-net-worth investors and partnering with top CRE operators.

Now, we build digital brands that attract capital at scale.

If you’re serious about raising capital and want your brand to do the heavy lifting, book a call in my featured section or visit credigital.io

Founder & Brand Advisor

Build Your Brand @ FinGhost.io

Your independence isn't violently taken from you.

It vanishes with 100s of "safe" decisions.

Here's how it happens (and ends up becoming a cage):

Age 18: You choose the "smart" major.

• Law.
• Finance. 
• Engineering. 
• Computer science.

Your parents are relieved. You're rewarded with scholarships and summer internships.

Age 22: You take the corporate job.

Goldman. McKinsey. Google. Whichever pays most and has the best brand.

Your professors congratulate you. Your classmates envy you. You're rewarded with a signing bonus and an impressive title.

Age 25: You accept the promotion.

More responsibility. More money. More visibility to senior leadership.

Your manager says you're on the "fast track." You're rewarded with status and a salary that justifies the lifestyle inflation you didn't plan.

Age 30: You take the management role.

People report to you now. You attend 10-15 meetings a week. You have influence—or at least the appearance of it.

You're rewarded with prestige and the comfort of knowing you're winning the game everyone else is playing.

Age 35: You wake up.

Your calendar isn't yours.
Your decisions aren't yours.
Your time isn't yours.

You're unhappy and burned out, but you can't move because you have a mortgage, car payment, daycare, and stock options vesting.

Every individual choice was rational.

But somewhere along the way, your autonomy disappeared.

The trap works because it's not obviously a trap.

It's comfortable. 
Respectable. 
Safe.

It's what winning looks like from the outside.

But from the inside, it feels like you're capable of more...smart enough to see the problems but powerless to fix them.

Successful by every conventional measure.

But somehow still not free.

This is the trap to avoid. 
Now you know what it looks like.

What you are working on in 2026 for more personal freedom in 2027?

--

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I build media systems for operators who want influence, growth, & capital at scale | $50M raised through social | Founder & Writer

Don't quit your 9-5 to go "all in" as a solopreneur until you have 4 things: 
 
- Proven offer 
- Clients paying you 
- Results and case studies 
- Consistent lead gen systems 
 
Give yourself 6-12 months to build skills and undeniable social proof before you leap. 
 
In 2019 I quit my job, spent a fat chunk of my life savings, and failed at going solo. 
 
I had 0/4 essentials above. 
 
Didn't know how to write. 
Didn't know how to sell. 
Didn't know how to build. 
 
In 2022 I made a successful transition from 9-5 to building a full-time creator income. 
 
But I worked for 12 months alongside my 9-5: 
 
• Testing ideas 
• Growing on LinkedIn 
• Finding proof of concept 
 
I'm confident everyone who reads this can build a full-time income as a creator. 
 
But only if you set yourself up for success. 
 
That's why I write weekly guides giving actionable strategies for making the leap. 
 
Need a good place to start? 
 
Read this: https://lnkd.in/e-RX6KFj

“Set a goal to become a millionaire—not for the money, but for what it will make of you.”

Jim Rohn damn near invented the category of personal development.

This is one of his hardest-hitting quotes.

In one sentence, it shifted my mindset around goals.

Setting goals is less about the end result, and more about who you become in the process of achieving it.

Early in my career, I chased all the wrong things.

→ If I only got that raise...
→ If I could just get that VP title...
→ If I check one more big goal off my list...

I thought if I just hit the next milestone, then I’d feel free. Then I’d feel successful.

But learning from people like Jim Rohn, I realized:

The goals weren't a magic checklist.

The goals were about who I had to become to achieve them.

→ A person who can communicate better
→ A person who can be self-reliant
→ A person who can grow and improve

Writing did that for me.

It gave me clarity.
It built proof of work.
It opened doors that used to be locked.

But more than that, it forced discipline. It exposed gaps in how I think. And it helped me build leverage instead of just more output.

So yeah, set big goals.

But understand: the real win isn’t the number.

It’s who you have to become to earn it.

That’s where the compounding starts.

What's the WHY behind your biggest goal right now?

Anthony Carlton

Do you want to be impressive or independent?

99% optimize for an "impressive" cage.

Achievement looks like:

- Climbing the corporate ladder
- Adding prestigious titles to LinkedIn
- Hitting salary milestones
- Getting promoted faster than peers
- Building a resume that impresses strangers

Achievement is external validation.

It's playing a game someone else designed and winning by their rules.

Agency looks like:

- Owning your calendar
- Making decisions without approval
- Building assets that compound
- Disconnecting time from income
- Designing work around your life, not the other way around

Agency is internal freedom.

It's designing your own game and defining what winning means.

Here's the trap:

Achievement is measurable, visible, and celebrated.
Agency is quiet, personal, and invisible to others.

So we chase achievement because it's easier to see we're making progress.

We climb faster, earn more, get promoted sooner. And wake up one day realizing we built an impressive cage.

I spent my 20s optimizing for achievement.

• Better titles. 
• Higher salary. 
• More responsibility.

I looked successful on paper but felt trapped in practice.

Now I optimize for independence.

• More decisions I own. 
• Fewer meetings I didn't schedule. 
• Systems that don't require my constant presence.

It's less impressive to people on LinkedIn.

But infinitely more valuable to me.

The question isn't "How do I achieve more?"

The question is "How do I build for optionality?"

--

♻️ Repost if this resonates.

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The Legal Profession’s Top Ghostwriter | 25M + views on LinkedIn | Creative Director at CONTENDER | Co-Founder of UNrationed | Author of In the Creative Arena

If you're an attorney, the people you want to talk to—potential clients, referral sources, and talent—are all on this platform. 

And while your traditional marketing channels are intensely competitive, the feeds of the people you want to reach on LinkedIn are ripe for the picking. 

We're still early in the content creation game on this platform, which has more than a billion users worldwide and ~200 million in the United States. 

Very few attorneys or law firms have even made an effort to stand out.

CONTENDER helps attorneys produce LinkedIn content that resonates with the people you want to reach, so they can Know, Like, and Trust you.


ARE YOU READY TO...

- Become a trusted AUTHORITY in your market?
- Grow your audience and dramatically increase your reach on LinkedIn? 
- Build a recognized PERSONAL BRAND?

🟦 GHOSTWRITING SERVICES 
- Our done-for-you LinkedIn content produces results for growing your presence and your firm. 

🟦 LINKED LAWYER BOOTCAMP
- I’ve developed the premier training program for lawyers looking to level up on LinkedIn. 

About Me 

I’m a former lawyer and current serial entrepreneur based in a forest north of Toronto, where I live with my wife and 2 little monsters. 

I’m the author of In The Creative Arena: Why Creativity Is Key To Building Your Future.

I’m also a co-founder of: 
CONTENDER (www.contenderllc.com)
Unrationed (www.unrationed.com)

Anthony Albrecht

Jelson sent me a cold DM asking if I need a VA. 
I don’t. But yesterday, I sent him $600 anyway. 

Why'd I do that? 

I like running experiments out here. 

And the peculiar truth is, Jelson Jr. Grothe DM'd me at a time when I'm not looking for VA support...

I am, however, in the market for someone to send $600 to. 

And without knowing it, Jelson sold me. 

How? 

He’s posting consistently. 
He’s generous in how he’s showing up. 
After reading a few of his posts, I'm interested in Jelson. 

He’s got a wife, a 1-month-old daughter, and a sincere desire to put in the work to make good things happen. 

Very quickly, I was rooting for him. 
Watch this video, and I think you’ll be rooting for Jelson too. 

That’s how he became my guy. 

I've run a lot of LinkedIn experiments over the last 4 years.
This one's different.  

I seriously don’t need a full-time VA right now. I’m posting this video hoping that somebody might. 

And I’d love it if getting $600 from a total stranger for no reason was the second-best thing Jelson gets out of this.  

I'll keep you updated. ;-)

Tony Albrecht

“The Yoda of LinkedIn” for Lawyers | Helping you go from invisible to unforgettable out here.

I’ve generated > $1,000,000 in revenue from LinkedIn. But let’s rewind to October 2021…

I was walking away from the practice of law 6 months after moving to Canada. 

My buddy Joshua and I had hatched a plan for me to join his consulting company. I was going to be MMG’s first Director of Business Development. 

My job—

Sell Salesforce implementations to nonprofit organizations. 

It was Josh who said to me, You’re going to need to learn how to do LinkedIn. 

I was not excited. 

Through 12 years as a lawyer, I’d more or less ignored LinkedIn
I had roughly 368 connections here. 
And I’d met just about every one of those people out in the real world. 

But I told Josh I’d try. 

I did Justin Welsh’s Operating System course. 
I paid more attention to LinkedIn. 
In January 2022, I started posting daily. 

I got the hang of it.

More views. More followers. More conversations. 

But 1 thing I did NOT get…
More sales. 

9 months into my time with MMG, I had sold precisely 0 Salesforce implementations to nonprofit organizations. 

Zero. 

But I did sell my first LinkedIn ghostwriting contract that month. 

Josh and I had a heart to heart. He told me I might want to take a proper crack at LinkedIn ghostwriting, a thing that would have occurred to me as a way to make money a year earlier. 

He offered to be my partner or my investor. 

So that’s what we did. 

3 years later, here we are. 
CONTENDER has generated more than $1 million from this platform. 
A team that started with just me is now 9. 
A future I’m excited to pursue. 

I tell you all that to tell you this—

I’ve sucked at LinkedIn far longer than I’ve been good at it. 
If you suck at LinkedIn today, I feel you. 

Once it clicks for you, things can flip very quickly. 
And it’s worth it.

Taking lawyers from invisible to unforgettable on LinkedIn | “The Yoda of LinkedIn” for Lawyers

Over the last ~3 months, I’ve spent > $10k on 4 people I mention in this post. 

In October, I joined 60 other creative entrepreneurs at Robb Gilbear’s Do Bold Shit event in Toronto. Many in that room have become friends over the last couple of years. 

2 days after the event ended, I bought my ticket to DBS 2026. 

There’s a bit of the $10k I mentioned. 

At that event, I met Kyler Miles, who was capturing video content for Robb. He also gave an awesome talk about how to build a high-leverage YouTube channels. 

Kyler and I are working together for the next 6 months as I take a proper crack at YouTube. 

There’s another chunk. 

Also at that event, Natalie Evie shared that her company is shifting directions. She wanted to help her excellent VA Nath find her next role.  I told Natalie to put me in touch. 

Nathslei Gerona has been a full-time CONTENDER for a month. She's doing an awesome job. 

Finally, I watched Rina Rovinelli and Dan Shaikh give a talk about the power of telling your story from stages. 

5 minutes later, I walked up to Rina and said, "We need to work together.”

I signed on for speaker coaching. 10 days from now, I’m taking the stage in my first Speaker Slam competition. 

That’s the fourth piece of that > $10k I’m talking about. 

(I've also reserved a booth of 8 for the Speaker Slam event. Of the 8 people who’re coming, my wife Sawil is the only person I did not meet through LinkedIn.) 

Why am I telling you all this? 

Everything I'm talking about in this post has happened directly because of LinkedIn. 

Very few people see the value of building your Linkedin network. 

And a lot of folks who DO seem some utility view it primarily as a way to GET something (money, clients, etc) rather than an opportunity to GIVE something. 

I am a node in this network. 
So are you. 

So are Robb and Rina and Kyler and Natalie and Nath. 

The more we invest INTO our networks (with our time, our attention, our money, etc), the more we will receive. 

So yes, I’ve spent a good deal money with the people. And I’m grateful to have the margin to do it. 

But I’m not being altruistic here. 
I’m placing bets. 

I’m betting that strengthening my bonds with these other nodes in my Linky network will lead to compounding benefits for me, my business, and my family. 

You can do the same thing. 
With money, your time, and your attention. 

At the risk of engagement baiting....

You leaving a comment on this post, for instance, is you placing a bet that you're strengthening the bond between you and me just a little bit. 

Placing that bet isn’t likely to pay off for you today. 
But over time, those little bets can create a stronger bond between us. 

It’s that bond that leads to opportunities. 

I fear this post is too woo woo for some.
My hope is it helps 1 person think different about LinkyLand. 

We'll see. ;-) 


----
I got 4 of 25 spots left for my Linky Foundations workshop next Friday: 
https://lnkd.in/efZncmZe

This is a straight-up sales post. 
I'm running a 90-minute workshop on Jan 23. 

If you've been wondering: 
• How do these people come up with enough ideas to post this much? 
• I get what a DM IS. But who in god's name would I send one TO? And WHY? 
• How do I send DM's that other folks will actually respond to? 
• Why don't my posts break 2k impressions and theirs get 9 million?
• Using real words...Can anybody explain what a personal brand is? 
• Can I actually use this thing to get new clients? 
• Why does the stuff on my feed always seem to suck? 
• Photo? No photo? Selfie? 
• Is your beard real, Tony? 

I'm going to answer all of these questions and more during my LinkedIn Foundations workshop. 

My goal for this workshop is that you're going to get more insight into how to navigate and leverage this platform in these 90 minutes than throughout the rest of your career combined. 

Or at least I'll take a crack at it. 

The peculiar truth is that we're all ON LinkedIn because we felt like we NEEDED to create profiles for our jobs.

But we all learned LinkedIn the wrong way. 

This platform is not the place to: 
• look for jobs
• stash your digital resume, and 
• share firm press releases. 

I mean, you can do all those things here. But that's just scratching the surface. 

What I discovered back in 2022 (and have spent the last 4 years studying every day) is that when you understand some basic principles about how energy and attention move out here, leveraging the platform to attract attention and create opportunities gets—I won't say easy—let's say readily doable. 

I've been playing around with the 4 foundational P's: 
• presenting (how you show up) 
• positioning (where you sit in the network vis a vis everybody else—this matters a ton)
• posting (you know this one), and 
• participating (DM's, comments, and so on). 

I've generated more than $1M in revenue directly from LinkedIn. 
I've worked with a bunch of the best-known lawyers on this platform.
I've studied this game from dozens of vantage points while amassing 70M + views. 
I've helped generate referrals, hires, clients, speaking opportunities, and an invite to the Bachelorette. 

And yet, I've spent 3x as long ignoring this platform during my career as an attorney as I have leveraging it as....whatever it is I am now. ;-) 

I'm designing this workshop with entrepreneurial lawyers in mind, but the ground we'll cover will apply across a lot of different industries. 

It's at noon EST on Friday, Jan 23rd. 

You can register here: 
https://lnkd.in/efZncmZe

Cost is $167. If you're strapped for cash due to circumstance or geography but really want to be in this zoom room, DM me. I'll bet we can work it out. 

7 of the 25 spots are already locked down. 

Let me know if you've got questions, and thanks for reading this far. 

You got any burning questions about LinkyLand?

Why'd I sign up for an inspirational speaking competition? 

I feel like the "right" answer is—
To inspire people with my story. 

Is my story all that inspiring though? 

I don't know. I think of my story largely as the story of a guy who:
• was very lucky in life
• almost screwed it all up with booze and
• managed to avoid catastrophe by learning to get out of his own way.  

If there's something inspiring in my story, it's the idea that change is possible. 

A guy could wake up in a Guamanian jail cell 3 months into his career as a lawyer...
way down a hole toward moral bankruptcy and self-destruction...
And turn it around. 

But I didn't apply to be on the Speaker Slam stage tomorrow might because I think anybody needs my story. 

I applied because getting on stage freaks me out. 
And I needed a new creative challenge that feels like an edge. 

I've spent 6 weeks preparing a 5-minute speech with the help of Daniel Burns. 

Yesterday Sawil Ghorany and my kids helped me figure out what I'm going to wear. 

If you're interested in coming out or watching the livestream, ticket info is here: 
https://lnkd.in/ePFJgxBF

I feel ready. We're going to let it rip. 

Should be fun...I think.

Here are 37 guesses as to why your LinkedIn strategy isn't working. 

1. You’re too focused on vanity metrics (likes, impressions, etc).

2. You haven’t played the game long enough to get good. 

3. Your favorite thing to post on LinkedIn is how much you dislike LinkedIn.

4. You're not standing out from the other 10,000 people who say they do the same thing.

5. You’re afraid of what your boss, coworkers, former colleagues, friends, acquaintances, or total strangers might think of yours posts. 

6. You think posting is enough. 

7. Your posts read like SEO blog posts.

8. You see LinkedIn as a billboard to post ON, not a network to tap INTO.

9. You are falling into the fuzzy math trap (if I can get X followers and Y number of them buy my $38 product) I’ll make 2 gajillion dollars). 

10. You’re selling something people don’t want. 

11. You’re selling something people say they want but aren’t willing to pay for. 

12. You’re selling something people do want, but can’t afford.

13. You’re selling something people want and can afford, but they don’t see you as THE person qualified to deliver. 

14. You sell in every post. 

15. You’re aiming your offer at the wrong group of people.  

16. You’re selling something you don’t understand. 

17. You don’t know what Personal Branding means. 

17. You don’t care about the thing you’re selling. 

18. You think you’re selling a product or service when you need to be selling a solution to a problem. 

19. You think Personal Branding is stupid, fatuous, vacuous, hideous, and/or insidious. 

20. You’ve priced your thing too low. 

21. You have not learned the difference between lead gen and demand gen.

22. You don’t even know what demand generation is. (I didn't before 2023)

23. You’re playing this game as a lone wolf.

24. You don’t show the POV (point of view) from your corner of the universe. 

25. You’re selfish with your attention. 

26. You don’t comment on other people’s posts. 

27. You don’t even try to find posts interesting enough to comment on. 

28. You haven’t decided who your target audience is. 

29. You haven’t clarified your ICP (ideal client profile). 

30. Your ICP is not specific enough. 

31. Your ICP is the wrong ICP. 

32. You’re allergic to the DM’s (because of spam). 

33. You’re allergic to the DM’s because you don’t want to be spammy. 

34. You’re one of the people sending DM's that makes other people sneeze. 

35. You don’t have a strategy at all. 

36. You haven’t found product market fit—yet. 

37. You haven’t gotten into the flow out here—yet. 

But you can. 

If you:
- want to, 
- are determined enough to stick with it, & 
- get maybe just a little bit lucky.  

I can rattle off 37 Linky mistakes because I’ve made almost every one of these. 😉

We're all learning in real time. 
You can too. 

Any favorite mistakes you've made from my list? 

----
PS - 5 spots left in my LinkedIn Foundations workshop on Jan 23: 
https://lnkd.in/efZncmZe

I have a new client who posted 50 times in 2025.
With our first 3 posts over the last 2 weeks: 

• 2 have already spread farther than 31,867 views (his top post last year) and 
• 2 are among the top 3 posts re: engagements. 

My client is the same law firm owner who's been showing up out here. He hasn't changed much over the last month. 

So how can we do that? 

Why am I able to take somebody who’s been trying to make LinkedIn work and dramatically improve their performance overnight? 

You might see these stats and think I’m running a scam over here. That the reach and engagement are a product of pods (basically paid engagement) or shenanigans. 

That’s not what I’m doing. 

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what the "secret" (if there is one) might be. 

I think it boils down to 2 things. 

1. After writing thousands of posts, I understand how to shape writing to fit LinkedIn. 

This is the technical side of what we do. 
Writing hooks. 
Including details. 
Keeping posts aerodynamic. 

That’s a big part of it. 

But I think the second thing is more important. 

2. I’ve learned how to get the ‘good stuff’ from clients. 

By that, I mean I’ve learned how to mine a person’s career and life to find stories that can resonate with folks. 

This client’s best 2 posts ever have now come in the last 2 weeks. 
But the subject matter of those posts happened years ago. 

My guy just needed some help getting those stories out. 

If you want to make posts that spread out here, you don’t need to hire CONTENDER. 

You probably do need to learn these 2 skills. 

If you’ve got any questions about how to do that, feel free to drop them below, I’ll do my best to answer. 



------------
My LinkedIn Foundations Workshop happening Friday is sold out. 
The last of the 25 seats got snapped up Monday. 

I'm going to do it again on Friday, Feb 27. 
You can find the info and registration for that one here: 
https://lnkd.in/eKD9dcyn

And I'll DM an original poem of gratitude to the first 2 people to register. ;-b

Here’s 1 counter-intuitive thing that can absolutely destroy a post’s reach out here—

Posting a link with the auto-populated image. 

Marshall Friday ran into this one a couple weeks ago. He posted about how a post of his that included a link just didn’t move. 

Marshall’s conclusion in the moment was that Linky still hates links in posts. 

But no. Linky is fine with links in posts. I promise. 

What happened was when Marshall dropped the link in the draft, Linky automatically generated that visual of what the link leads to. 

That’s what killed the post. 

It makes no sense that this is true. 

But I’ve made this mistake enough times that I can confirm it’s a thing. 

How can you avoid this pitfall? 

When you drop the link in your draft, the image pops up. 
If you hover over the image, you’ll get a little X up there. 
Click that. 

The image disappears. 
You’re good to go.

I ran a new experiment out here last week. 
This was the experiment—

If I post a poll asking if folks are interested in a workshop on the basics of gaining traction on LinkedIn...

a) would anybody raise their hands? and if so
b) would any of those people be totally new on my radar? 

I only kept the poll open for 24 hours (instead of 3 or 7 days). 

37 votes. 

20 for "Yes where do I sign up?"
9 for "Maybe depends on my mood."
2 for "Naw dude, I'm good." 
And 5 for "I'm sorry but...Who are you?" 

So I had 29 folks raise their hands to say they'd like to know more. 

My next experiment is seeing how many of those folks actually register. 

At this workshop, we'll run through some LinkedIn 101 stuff about: 
• positioning
• personal brand 
• content creation and ideation 
• engagement (commenting and dm'ing). 

I’ve spent the last 3 years helping lawyers attract attention and opportunities here. 

3 of the top 10 US lawyers on LinkedIn per Favikon are on my roster. 

My goal here is that we meaningfully improve your understanding of LinkedIn and your content game in 90 minutes. 

I'm limiting us to 25 people in the zoom room on Friday, Jan 23rd at noon EST. 

If you're interested, details are here. 
https://lnkd.in/efZncmZe

Feel free to dm me with any questions about the workshop, LinkedIn more generally, the meaning of life. I've got thoughts on all of the above.

Be consistent. Be generous. Be yourself. | “The Yoda of LinkedIn” for Lawyers

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The Battle

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Anthony Carlton's LinkedIn Performance

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