Lancelotta Consulting is a Boston-based consulting company specializing in providing flexible, insightful qualitative market research services to pharmaceutical and biotech companies.
Founded in 2007 by principal Kevin Lancelotta, the firm serves as an adviser and partner to some of the world’s largest life sciences companies, providing guidance information promotional strategies, a better understanding of marketplace development and a jump start on the development of branding, marketing and consumer outreach campaigns.
“To get this level of sound quality from such a small, portable recorder is quite impressive,” Lancelotta said. “You quite literally get pro-level recording capabilities in a sleek, portable device; one that fits in your pocket. This is the rare device that combines portability without sacrificing audio richness and clarity.”
The Challenge: An extreme use case
In the pharma/biotech space, qualitative market research is an extremely work-intensive process. For consultants like Lancelotta, it involves near-constant nationwide and international travel, working on projects comprised of dozens or hundreds of individual interviews. The sheer amount of data collected from individual interviews and focus groups each and every week, month and year is staggering.
Of course, it’s not enough to simply gather that data. To be of use to clients, it must all be organized, transcribed and synthesized, then reported back in an actionable form. That means Lancelotta needed:
- A feature-rich, durable and portable device capable of recording eight or more hours of interviews each day, while maintaining excellent sound quality.
- Easy connectivity with laptops or computer.
- A simple way to organize, route and sort recordings.
The Solution: DS-7000
After exploring several options, Kevin Lancelotta chose to record his interviews and memos using an Olympus DS-7000 digital voice recorder. The DS-7000, part of the Olympus Professional Dictation line of premium recording devices, easily meets all the needs of the qualitative market researcher – which exceed those of nearly any other businessperson.
The Olympus DS-7000 includes many features that allow Lancelotta to meet even the most complex interviewing and recording challenges, work efficiently and deliver work that thrills his ever-growing roster of clients.
- All-day recording: Lancelotta’s individual interview and focus group sessions routinely last upwards of eight hours. The DS-7000 is more than capable of keeping up. Its lithium-ion battery allows for up to 21 hours of continuous recording, and recharges every time the recorder is connected to Lancelotta’s laptop or placed in its cradle. Likewise, the DS-7000 includes 2 gigabytes of micro SD internally, while a SD card slot allows for essentially unlimited recording capacity. Even under extreme use, the DS-7000 never quits.
- Crystal-clear sound quality: Lancelotta never misses a word, thanks to the Olympus DS-7000’s independently housed, speech-optimized microphone and multiple recording modes. The recorder has proven itself both in one-on-one interviews and in focus groups. In extreme cases – huge rooms or conference-style meetings – it can easily be fitted with a secondary external microphone. Olympus’ DSS-Pro recording format allows for rich sound reproduction without creating unreasonably large file sizes.“To get this level of sound quality from such a small, portable recorder is quite impressive,” Lancelotta said. “You quite literally get pro-level recording capabilities in a sleek, portable device; one that fits in your pocket. This is the rare device that combines portability without sacrificing audio richness and clarity.”
- Intuitive controls: Lancelotta’s specialty is creating an extremely personal feel during his interviews, allowing his subjects to feel at ease. That means he can’t spend his time fiddling with a recorder, trying to get a feature to work. The DS-7000 delivers here, with a simple slide switch activating basic controls (“play,” “record,” “stop”) and three programmable function buttons working just how Lancelotta needs them to work. The red “record” light is as obvious as he needs it to be – ensuring visual confirmation that the recorder is on, while keeping interviewees at ease.
- Professional appearance: With its full-color LCD screen and durable aluminum housing, recorders can match the aesthetic excellence of the DS-7000 – an important consideration in the corporate environment.
- Maximum security: As very large companies in a regulated space, Lancelotta’s clients require the utmost discretion. The DS-7000 keeps all interview and focus group recordings completely secure, with PIN locking and real-time 256-bit file encryption. Even if the DS-7000 was lost or stolen, the data it contains would never be compromised.
- Advanced software: Lancelotta needs only to plug his DS-7000 into his laptop or place it in its cradle to activate his Olympus Dictation Management System (ODMS) software. The fully configurable software suite can automatically download, save and route recordings – making organization easy, even with dozens or hundreds of files. Secure archiving is as easy as a cloud computing account or a redundant backup hard drive.
DS-7000: The right digital recorder for business
Doing qualitative market research is tough. Doing it extremely well – like Lancelotta – is almost impossible. Still, it’s a hugely competitive industry, and any leg up is worth its weight in gold.
For Lancelotta, that’s digital recording with the Olympus DS-7000 – a professional-level digital recorder for business.