What are quotas and how do I set them on Every?

Quotas are useful sometimes, but what are they and when should you use them when conducting research?

Want to skip to just the section you need? Check out the article sections below!

1. What are quotas?
2. Why would I set a quota in my survey?
3. What do I need to be careful of when using quotas?
4. How to set quotas on Every
5. How much do we charge per quota?

What are quotas?

Quotas are a type of criteria you can set in your survey, where you set an expected number of responses from a specific answer option. The three types of quotas you can set are:

1. A minimum number of respondents who select an answer option
2. A maximum number of respondents who select an answer option
3. An exact number of respondents who select an answer option

For example, if you were to ask “Which of the following fruits have you consumed in the past week?”, and you wanted to ensure that you had a minimum of 50 people who selected “Apples”, this criteria would be referred to as a quota. 

You can also set quotas for making sure a maximum of 50 people have selected “Apples”, or exactly 50 people have selected “Apples”. 

Why would I set a quota in my survey?

Depending on your research objectives, you may need to set quotas for various reasons. 

The most common use of quotas is when you decide that the respondents you collect should on the whole be representative of the age, gender, ethnic and regional split in a particular country. This helps to ensure that the responses provided would represent the sentiment of the country you have surveyed.

Does this mean your sample always needs to be nationally representative in terms of age, gender, ethnicity and region? Not always.

If you were looking for a specific audience, for example car owners, it would not make sense to have a certain percentage of them be below the legal driving age. That would make the age group quotas unnecessary, as car owners are likely to be older individuals who can afford to purchase and/or maintain ownership of a car. 

Quotas are also useful when you’d like to ensure that you would get an adequate number of respondents who select a certain answer option. If for example you know that Brand A is a very popular brand in Malaysia that’s being used by 60% to 70% of the population, but you are from Brand B, that’s being used by 10% to 15% of the population. Let’s say that you as a researcher for Brand B would like to ask some probing questions to Brand B users about why they use your brand, because their responses will help you to determine your ad campaign focus for the next year. 

You can set a quota requirement that says you would like a minimum of 20% of your respondents to select Brand B in your survey, so that you would have a large enough sample of Brand B users to ask probing questions to. 

Alternatively, if your research objective was to analyse the users of competitors aside from Brand A, you could set a quota requirement that says you would like a maximum of 50% of your respondents to select Brand A in your survey, so that the remaining 50% of respondents would be respondents who selected a brand aside from Brand A. 

What do I need to be careful of when using quotas?

Keep in mind that setting quotas can introduce a bias to your data. 

Let’s use the same example above, where you are from Brand B (which has a user base of about 10% to 15% of the population) and Brand A has a user base of 60% to 70% of the population. You have now inserted a quota into your survey looking for a minimum of 20% of respondents to select Brand B as a brand that they currently use, so that you can ask them probing questions about why they use Brand B.

You cannot now claim that Brand B has a user base of 20% of the population. This is because you have controlled the respondents in such a way that it is ensured that you have 20% saying they use Brand B, but this 20% is not representative of reality; it has been manufactured! 

When using data from any question where a quota has been set, make a note when presenting the data that the numbers from certain answer options have been controlled, and the data as a result will likely not be representative of actual consumer sentiment! 

You should also be mindful to use quotas sparingly! Introducing too many quotas into your survey can make collecting responses more difficult, as with each quota you set, you are making the target audience you’re looking for more and more niche and difficult to find. Not to mention you will need more disclaimers on how the data you’ve collected is not representative of actual consumer sentiment!

How to set quotas on Every

If you would like to set quotas for age, race, gender, state or region, let us know and we’ll put them in place for you!

If you’d like to set quotas based on an answer option in one of your questions, use the steps shown below:

1. Insert your question and answer options into the survey builder, then select “Add Quota” in the question settings (shown in a red box below).
   
2. After you select “Add Quota”, this tab will appear. Here is where you will be able to set the specific amount of samples you require per answer option.
   Using the same example as before, if you have a total sample size of 400 respondents, setting a 20% minimum quota for Brand B means that you’re looking for a minimum of 80 respondents selecting Brand B. 
   1. Check Brand B as the option you’d like to set a quota for:
      
   2. From the dropdown, select “At Least” as this is the minimum quota option (with “Exactly” being the quota option looking for a fixed number of responses and “At Most” being the quota option looking for a maximum number of responses).
      
   3. Insert the minimum number of responses you’re looking for. In this example, it would be 80.
      
   4. Click “Save”, shown in a red box below.
      
   5. You can add on quotas for other questions and answer options the same way.
3. If you would like to remove all quotas from a question, click on “Remove Quotas”, shown in a red box below.
   

How much do we charge per quota?

You can refer to this article to see how quotas are priced, along with the rest of your survey! 

If you need additional information regarding quotas, you can always reach out to us via the chatbot below!