Erin O. Patton

What do Michael Jordan, LeBron James and The Williams Sisters have in common? They have all turned to Erin Patton to help build their brands. Patton is widely regarded as one of the nation’s foremost experts on branding, sports marketing and Hip-Hop culture. He is Founder of The Mastermind Group (TMG), a brand management and strategic marketing consulting firm that has provided counsel to an exclusive client roster of Fortune 500 brands and pop culture icons.

Patton has been instrumental in the most notable footwear product launches in history. During his tenure with Nike, Inc, he was hand picked by Michael Jordan as the original architect for the JORDAN brand, engineering its successful launch in 1997. He later spearheaded NBA star Stephon Marbury’s award-winning Starbury brand launch that revolutionized the sneaker industry and earned launch of the year from Footwear News and Advertising Age in 2006.

As an expert on consumer behavior, Patton has also been hailed for “cracking the code on the urban market” with his breakthrough 7 Ciphers™ segmentation study that attracted flagship sponsors including MTV, Pepsi and The Brookings Institution.

en recognized with awards from distinguished organizations including the coveted Edison Award from the American Marketing Association, United Nations Honorable Mention, International Public Relations Association, The Network Journal’s “Forty Under Forty Award” and the Innovator Award from the Advertising Research Foundation (ARF).

Gifted as a dynamic public speaker with extraordinary communication skills, Patton is highly sought out as a speaker at conferences, symposiums, universities and corporations. He has appeared as an expert on ESPN, CNN, VH1, and Fox News and been quoted in USA Today, Time, Newsweek, Business Week, Wall St. Journal and Fortune. In 2009, he released his first book, “Under The Influence: Tracing the Hip-Hop Generation’s Impact on Brands, Sports & Pop Culture” to critical acclaim.

Patton currently serves on the faculty of the SMU Cox School of Business as an Adjunct Lecturer. As a staunch proponent of transformational leadership to enhance organizational effectiveness, he also conceived the SMU Cox Sport Leadership Consortium in 2009. The innovative program targets front-office executives of sports franchises and businesses as well as professional athletes transitioning from sports to business.

Patton demonstrates his civic leadership by devoting his time, talent and treasure to leading, national non-profit organizations including Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) which uses sports to teach life lessons and build character. He is also a board member of the Texas Leadership Forum, SMU Athletic Forum and Hispanic Youth Symposium, a program of the Hispanic College Fund.

Patton is a graduate of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He later earned his MBA from the SMU Cox School of Business in Dallas. He currently resides in Frisco, Texas with his wife Nicole and two young sons

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