Heidi Pearson

Managing Director, THE MRKT

Chicago

Heidi Pearson is a 16-year veteran of public relations strategy, experiential marketing and content production. She has enjoyed crafting branded entertainment and multicultural consumer engagement campaigns while holding senior leadership roles for Chicago’s top public relations and marketing firms, including Edelman, Weber Shandwick, Ketchum, and Burrell Public Relations. Her approach to developing winning strategies for brands and influencers is rooted in utilizing consumer insights to expand the way businesses think about PR strategy, while leading dynamic results driven teams, and capturing value for brands in the real world.

Heidi has presented to private groups at The University of Chicago’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship, YouTube, Google, and participated in recognized panels such as ADweek’s annual Taste of Brandweek series. Heid has honed her strategic branding and digital storytelling capabilities within the consumer-packaged goods, ethnic beauty, hair care and cosmetics, health care, food retail, film and television, digital streaming platforms, and consumer entertainment places and spaces. Heidi is known for her advocacy efforts geared towards Black creatives and influencers of color in a diverse range of categories.

Heidi’s latest role as Managing Director for The MRKT allows her to interface with studio and network executives while serving as the AA division lead for notable accounts such as AppleTV, Amazon’s Prime Video, Disney+, AMC, OWN, Sony and NBC Universal. She has also lead DEI and consultative media training for ABC’s Bachelor and Bachelorette franchises. Her role as co-producer of the documentary Genius of a Different Hue has made her a sought-after advocate for diversity in the advertising industry throughout Silicon Valley and beyond.

Heidi holds an MBA from DePaul University with a major in Economics & Business Strategy and serves as the Economics Department Alumni Ambassador. As a native New Orleanian, she is an avid culture buff, art lover, photographer and self-proclaimed Top-Chef. She currently resides in Chicago, Illinois with her daughter who loves writing afro-futurism books, club volleyball, painting, playing the bass guitar and TikTok.