Shooting extremely sunny scenes -- especially those at the beach -- confronts you with a similar problem to shooting snow.
There's lots of reflectivity involved, and that will fool your camera's built-in meter into thinking that it should expose the shot darker than is desirable.
Handle the situation the same way that you do when shooting in snow. Additionally, though, you might consider using your camera's built-in flash or an add-on flash if you have one.
Using a flash to photograph people who are standing in front of a very bright background -- such as the ocean waves or on the beach -- will help to highlight the subjects and deemphasize the background.
No matter where you're shooting -- in the snow or in bright, sunny conditions -- remember that isolating your subject matter can often make for the most dramatic photographs of all.
Instead of trying to capture the big picture, move in close, perhaps activating and using your camera's macro feature.
Shooting up-close will often alleviate the problem of having too much reflectivity in your photograph altogether, and through isolating a scene that's representative, you may well end up with a picture that has the impact you desire.
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