Quota Overview
The core concepts and constraints of quota management — setting target counts per demographic cell for balanced sampling.
Quota management lets you split respondents into cells and assign a target count to each, so you can collect a balanced sample across segments. Representative sampling is essential for quantitative research, and quotas are how you enforce it.
When to use it
- Collect exactly 50 respondents per gender × age cell
- Split regions into 6 blocks and cap each block at 30 responses
- Pre-allocate counts for job × industry combinations needed for later segment analysis
Core concepts
- Cell: a cross-tabulation of quota axes. For example, "Male × 20s" is a single cell
- Target: the target collection count for a cell. Can be set as an absolute number or a percentage
- Buffer rate: how much over-collection is allowed. With a target of 50 and a 10% buffer, cells accept up to 55 responses before new respondents are screened out
- Total target: the total collection count for the whole survey. It must match the sum of all cell targets
Constraints
- Only one quota can be configured per survey. To run multiple quotas in parallel, split them into separate surveys
- Only SCREEN(SA) questions can be used as quota axes. MA (multiple answer) is not allowed because a single respondent would match multiple cells
- Screen-out options are automatically excluded from the quota matrix, since respondents who screen out are not counted anyway
Next step
For step-by-step setup instructions, see Quota Setup. To monitor collection progress in real time, see Quota Monitoring.