Backcountry Marketing

What happens when a brand makes great products but struggles to give people a reason to care about the brand beyond the product itself? Mike Peck, VP of Creative at Brooks Running, joins the show to discuss the role of creative in building distinctive brands, creating emotional connections, and driving long-term growth. We explore why product innovation alone isn't enough to build a brand, why...

In this episode, Nic Brandenberger, CMO at Mammut, joins Cole Heilborn to unpack how outdoor brands can move beyond beautiful-yet-forgettable content and create social first marketing that people actually come back for more. In this episode, Nic and Cole talk about the difference between good content and great creative, why entertainment can be a powerful tool for brand marketing, and how Mammut...

In Episode 2 of The Relevance Project, Cole continues working with Kitworks, Loon'r, and SkyGOAT to move from brand strategy into actual content strategy. The episode starts by pressure-testing the idea of treating a brand like a character. For each of the three brands, those characters are becoming a tool for translating a point of view into recognizable behavior without necessarily putting a...

Creative is often treated as an expense. Joe Prebich, the VP of Benchmade Knife Company, believes the best creative can become one of a brand's most valuable growth assets. In this episode, Joe shares lessons from his time at Red Bull and Benchmade about why bold ideas matter, how great content can create distribution and long-term brand loyalty, and why much of the outdoor industry has become...

In the first episode of the Relevance Project, Cole sits down with the teams at SkyGOAT, Kitworks, and Loon'r to understand where each brand is starting, what they want organic content to accomplish, and how they'll measure progress along the way. The conversations reveal a shared challenge. The brands have audiences, products, and stories worth telling, but they haven't yet built a consistent...

Professor Jenni Romaniuk, Research Professor and Associate Director at the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, Adelaide University, breaks down the science behind how brands are remembered. We explore why memory is at the heart of effective marketing, why only a small percentage of buyers are in-market at any given time, and what marketers should be doing to build future demand. Jenni explains the concepts...

Cole shares the thinking behind The Relevance Project and why he believes relevance has become one of the most important competitive advantages available to brands today. The goal of marketing hasn't changed, but the landscape and tools have. Attention is becoming scarcer, paid media is becoming more expensive, audiences have more control over what they consume than ever before, and brands now...

After reviewing 19 brand applications, Port Side has selected three brands to work with: Kitworks, loon'r, and SkyGOAT. The Relevance Project is a public experiment exploring whether outdoor brands can become more relevant, recognizable, and memorable by creating audience-first content that builds attention, trust, and long-term demand. About: This podcast is produced by Port Side, a content...

Andy Pearson, VP of Creative at Liquid Death, explains why brands should stop thinking like advertisers and start thinking like entertainers. We dive into how Liquid Death built one of the largest organic audiences without relying on paid media, why humor is an underrated marketing tool, and why the best brands behave more like memorable characters than carefully managed style guides. We also...

The Relevance Project is underway! 15 brands have applied to be considered. If you want to apply, reach out to us and submit your application by June 26th. About: This podcast is produced by Port Side, a content strategy studio that helps outdoor brands become relevant, recognized, and build an audience. Want to learn more about how we can help? Enjoy this episode and discover other resources...