Esquire Pitches New Issue With Movie-Style Trailer [VIDEO]

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Esquire is among the latest to try its hand at promotional trailers, having released a trailer in February to tease a single article about exotic animal killings in its March edition. On Monday, Esquire will release another trailer to showcase the content in its August issue.

The new video preview is much more advanced than the one released in February, which was comprised of a handful of still images and text overlaid with audio. Its aim is different, too: While the first was designed to promote Esquire's editorial assets, the latest really plays up Esquire's growing arsenal of digital produce -- namely, its high-quality video footage of fast cars and beautiful women. As such, it's a more effective advertisement for Esquire's tablet editions and its website than for its core product: print.

Why create a trailer? David Granger, Esquire's editor-in-chief, says he and his team had more video for its August issue than usual. Yes, it will promote sales, but "mostly I just wanted to create something entertaining, something that hadn't been done by magazines before," he said.

The trailer will be posted to Esquire's website, YouTube channel, and social accounts this week. The print cover prominently displays a QR code that can be scanned to pull up the trailer on smartphones and other connected devices.

Granger said he could see the trailers becoming a regular production for Esquire, should he and his team find themselves with enough resources to make one every month.

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Beyond trailers, Granger and I also spoke about Esquire's future plans for ecommerce integration, now that its partnership with Clad has come to an end. Granger said he he and his team have been exploring other opportunities and, if all goes well, will unveil another ecommerce project in spring 2013. "It's a pretty tight integration -- what Clad was meant to be," he said.

I asked Granger if he had seen Refinery29's new ecommerce integration and whether he could envision a day when Esquire readers could add featured products to a shopping cart and check out directly from Esquire's website and apps.