Building a Business Around Surfing, Strategy & Creative Freedom

Dasi, close to the ocean and freedom

There’s a certain kind of founder who doesn’t just want to build a business, they want to build a life around the ocean, creativity, freedom, and meaningful work.

That’s exactly what drove Dasi, founder of Coastal Strategy Studio, to carve out her own path as a fractional CMO and brand strategist working with surf, ocean-inspired, and lifestyle brands across Australia and beyond.

Based on Victoria’s Surf Coast, Dasi works at the intersection of surf culture, marketing psychology, creative strategy, Meta advertising, and now increasingly, AI workflows and automation. But what makes her approach stand out is not just the strategy,  it’s the level of care she brings to the brands she works with.

“I don’t treat a client’s business like an outside project,” she says. “I work as if I’m part of the founding team.”

For founders building surf brands, creative businesses, ecommerce stores, or lifestyle companies, her story offers a real look into the realities of building a business that’s deeply connected to both passion and performance.

Falling Into Marketing Through Surfing

Like many stories in the surf world, this one started with travel.

While travelling through Costa Rica and falling in love with surfing, Dasi realised she wanted a lifestyle that allowed her to work remotely, stay close to the ocean, and build something creative without following a traditional path.She discovered marketing almost accidentally. “I’ve always loved writing,” she explains. “Once I discovered copywriting and marketing, something clicked.”

After working across agencies with clients ranging from dentists and lawyers to running shoe brands and clothing companies, she noticed something important: the work felt completely different when it connected back to surfing.

That clarity came through her first independent surf industry client, a surf business in Morocco called Olo Surf & Nature in Imsouane.

“That was the moment I realised I didn’t just love marketing. I loved marketing when it was connected to surfing, lifestyle, and brands I personally believed in.”

From there, Coastal Strategy Studio was born.

Building a Boutique Surf Marketing Strategy Studio

Today, Coastal Strategy Studio operates as a boutique marketing and strategy studio focused on surf, ocean-inspired, lifestyle, and purpose-led brands.

Rather than acting like a traditional agency churning through deliverables, Dasi positions herself more like an embedded strategic partner with broad expertise across the spectrum of marketing communications.

“I work closely with a small number of clients at a time, mainly surf, ocean-inspired, lifestyle, and purpose-led brands. The focus is not just on “posting more” or doing random marketing tasks, but on building a clear growth system around the brand: who they are, who they’re speaking to, what makes them different, and how to turn that into strategy, content direction, campaigns, and long-term growth.”

“Some clients need a strategic growth roadmap and guidance. Some need paid ads, campaign planning, and performance analysis. Others need deeper marketing leadership, someone to help connect the dots across their offers, messaging, content, launches, audience, and overall direction. So the work can include things like brand positioning, audience research, content strategy, marketing roadmaps, campaign planning, Meta ads strategy and management, performance reporting, launch support, and ongoing strategic guidance. The business is still small, but it’s growing with intention. I don’t want to build something that feels cold, disconnected, or overly corporate.”

Why Surf Brands Need More Than Just Content

One of the recurring themes throughout the conversation was the idea that marketing is often misunderstood, especially in lifestyle industries.

“There’s this idea that if someone has a lot of followers, they must be good at marketing,” Dasi says. “But being visible online and knowing how to build strategy, read data, create demand, and drive business results are very different things.”

Because while social media can create visibility, sustainable growth depends on understanding the full system — and that’s exactly where Dasi focuses.

“The people I work best with are founders who are passionate, open-minded, and ready to grow. They understand that marketing is not just about posting online or running ads, it’s about understanding your audience, understanding what human brains react to and what behaviours should be presented, reading the data, refining your message, and building a strategy that actually supports the business.”

This is where many surf and lifestyle brands struggle. They often have authentic stories, strong products, and engaged communities, but lack the strategic structure needed to scale. That’s where Dasi believes her strength lies: combining emotional connection with analytical thinking.

"Most surf brands understand culture intuitively. What they're often missing is the layer underneath, why people actually make decisions, what triggers action, what builds trust, and what quietly creates resistance. That's the behavioural science and neuromarketing side of what I do. It's not separate from the creative work. It's what makes the creative work actually land."

The Campaign That Generated a 10x Return

One recent campaign highlights how much small strategic adjustments can matter.

Working on a high-ticket offer for a client, Dasi managed a campaign with roughly $3,000 in ad spend that ultimately generated around $35,000 in revenue within a week. But the interesting part wasn’t the result. It was what happened before it worked.

“The campaign wasn’t working at first,” she explains. “Instead of panicking or changing everything, we looked at the data carefully and made one key adjustment to the creative.”

That single change shifted the campaign completely. For her, that experience reinforced an important lesson: good marketing is rarely random.

“For me, that’s what good marketing is really about. It’s not guessing, throwing random ideas at the wall, or changing everything at once. It’s about reading what’s happening, testing one thing at a time, and slowly building the formula that works.”

When One Reel Changed Everything

Another standout moment came through organic content. After working with a client for several months, one Instagram Reel “unexpectedly” exploded, helping the account grow from roughly 2,500 followers to more than 12,000 in just a few days. But again, the real value wasn’t just vanity metrics.

“It didn’t just grow her audience, it helped strengthen her positioning, increase her authority, and put her in front of a much larger group of people who were aligned with her work. What made it even more valuable was that we were also able to connect that attention to a product. Something that had originally been offered through a free exchange agreement was repositioned into a paid offer, and we were able to generate sales from it.”

It’s a reminder that for surf and lifestyle brands, organic content still matters, especially when the messaging, timing, and audience alignment are right.

The Hardest Part: Building Trust in the Surf Industry

Like many founders in the surf industry, Dasi says one of the hardest parts hasn’t been the work itself, it’s building trust and relationships.

“Surfing is such a relationship-driven industry,” she says. “Being an immigrant has also shaped the journey. I’ve had to build my credibility, community, and client base from the ground up in a country and industry where relationships already carry so much weight.” “Trust is everything,” she explains. “You have to build credibility slowly through consistency and results.”

After moving from Byron Bay to Victoria’s Surf Coast, she found herself rebuilding networks, reputation, and community connections from scratch. That challenge became especially real when she lost two clients unexpectedly during one winter period.

“It affected my confidence more than I expected,” she says. “But it also taught me how to separate my emotions from the business a little more.”

The experience forced resilience, something many founders quietly relate to.

Why AI Is Becoming Essential for Modern Founders

One of the strongest themes throughout the conversation was AI. Dasi believes one of the most important skills founders and marketers can develop right now is learning how to use AI beyond simple prompts.

“My biggest advice would be to learn how to properly use AI — not just as a chat tool, but as an actual assistant inside your business. I think a lot of people still use tools like ChatGPT or Claude only for back-and-forth conversations, but the real power is learning how to build agents, skills, workflows, and automations that support the way you work. The goal isn’t replacing human thinking. It’s protecting it. It’s about saving your energy for the work that actually needs your brain, strategy, creativity, client relationships, decision-making, and critical thinking.”

For many small surf and lifestyle businesses wearing multiple hats, that insight feels increasingly relevant.

Building a Business Around Surfing — Not Away From It

One of the most relatable parts of Dasi’s story is the way she talks about balance. Or more accurately, the blending of business and lifestyle. “I built this business because I wanted a life that allowed me to stay close to surfing, the ocean, and freedom.”

Not necessarily separation between work and life, but alignment between them.

“I try to organise my days around the waves whenever I can. Sometimes that means surfing before a meeting, between work blocks, or whenever the conditions line up. It’s not always perfect or glamorous, but being able to step away from the laptop and get in the water is a big part of what keeps me grounded.”

At the same time, I don’t think the switch ever fully turns off. Like a lot of founders, my work is a huge part of my personal life. I’m always thinking about ideas, clients, strategy, content, and what I’m building next. But I don’t really see that as a bad thing, because the work genuinely fills me up. It gives me energy, direction, and a sense of purpose. So for me, balance doesn’t always look like completely separating work and life. It looks like building a business that supports the life I actually want, and making sure I still get in the ocean whenever I can.

That’s something many Surfpreneurs members are chasing too.

“A good day for me starts early, ideally around 5am, when it’s still dark and quiet. I like having that first part of the day to myself, before everything gets busy. That’s usually when I try to work on the business, not just in the business, whether that’s building systems, thinking about the bigger picture, creating something new, or getting a few personal tasks done. Then I’ll usually grab a coffee, check the surf, and if the waves are good, get in the water before client work begins. After that, a good day would be a mix of creative client work, strategy, calls, and getting into a proper flow with ideas. I especially love the days where I’m working on something creative and can feel the direction clicking into place.”

Lessons for Other Surfpreneurs

Looking back on the journey so far, a few lessons stand out most for Dasi:

1. There Is Still Room For You

You don’t have to be the first, but you do have to know what you bring. “It’s easy to look around and feel like everyone else is already ahead, already established, or already doing the thing you want to do. But I’ve learned that if you have a real point of view, a strong work ethic, and you’re willing to keep showing up, there is still space for you. You don’t have to be the first. You just have to be clear on what you bring and keep building from there.”

2. Put Yourself Out There - surfing is a relationship industry

Surfing is a relationship industry. Before it's a business, it's a community. I've seen one introduction open more doors than six months of content. Show up, have real conversations, be genuinely curious about what other people are building, that's what moves things forward in this world."

3. Keep Sharpening Your Skills

Marketing evolves quickly, and right now, she believes AI is one of the biggest opportunities founders should be learning. But if she were to start again? She says she would build her personal brand and document her thinking from day one.

“If I started again, I would build my content and personal brand from the beginning. I would document more of my thinking, my process, my creative decisions, and the strategy behind the work. Not just polished results, but the actual thought process, how I look at a brand, how I analyse an audience, how I make decisions, and how I connect creativity with data.”

Because ultimately people buy trust, and showing how you think helps build it.

What’s Next for Coastal Strategy Studio?

Over the next 12 months, Dasi is focused on building AI agents, automations, skills, and workflows that take away the tasks that consume her time, especially the repetitive admin, research, reporting, lead research, and content organisation work. Not just using it for one-off prompts, but building systems that can research, organise, report, analyse, and support the business in the background.

“It feels like one of the most important things I’m learning right now, because the better I get at building these systems, the more capacity I create for better work, better ideas, and better service for my clients. Over the next 6 to 12 months, I’m really excited about rooting down in the Surf Coast and becoming more connected to the local community. It’s such a beautiful and magical place, and I feel like there’s so much potential here, not just for the business, but for the lifestyle and relationships I want to build around it.”

As she puts it:

“Connection isn’t just about giving and taking. It’s about energy. Being around people who inspire ideas and remind you why you’re building what you’re building. I'm building something I actually want to live inside, a business that creates real results for clients I believe in, in an industry I love, from a place I never want to leave. That's the whole point."

“I would love to say that I’m genuinely grateful this (Surfpreneurs Club) community exists. It feels like something I had been longing for, even before I knew how to explain it properly. I had this feeling that something like this was needed. A space for people in the surf world to connect, share, be seen, and build something together, but I didn’t fully know how to put it into words. And then you created it.” 

Thanks Dasi, we’re stoked you’re a part of Surfpreneurs club, too.

Connect With Dasi

🌊 Coastal Strategy Studio Website 

 📸Instagram – Coastal Strategy Studio

If you’re building a surf, ocean-inspired, or lifestyle brand and want to connect with other founders navigating similar challenges, join the conversation atSurfpreneurs Club