Google AdSense ad serving has been disabled

Not what you want in your inbox...

[m0thman]

I received one of these emails tonight. My site covers a wide variety of topics and has user forums. As it happens the URL they gave me was a visitor post that hadn't been caught by the filters or picked up manually. The page in question was perhaps borderline and did attract some stupid comments but the question is, how can you be sure that there isn't something else lurking out there that will get you into trouble one day. With thousands of comments posted every week it's difficult to catch them all and the 'mature content' thing is quite a grey area. For example, is talking about alcohol free beer a mature subject?

I've been in the AdSense business since about 2005 and always tried to make sure things are clean and this time I got burnt. Interestingly enough, ad serving hasn't been disabled site wide yet - perhaps that takes time to kick in. Anyway I've completely removed the page and all related comments and can't think of anything else that might be a problem. Here's hoping.... I'd hate to have to get a 9-5 again.

[Lucky_Ray]

I'm in the same boat. I have three main sites and they disabled the one that made the most and supported the other ones when they weren't making as much. My "violation" was borderline too. Makes me wonder if a competitor reported me to google but I kind of doubt it because I don't think anyone but google would have thought my ad placement violated terms of service.

Luckily for me, I just started selling e-books a few months ago and that brings in about as much or more as adsense did. So now, although I'm down, it's not as bad as it could be.

[m0thman]

Hi Wayne,

Sounds like a similar situation to mine, I've been using AdSense as my main income for about 4 years. Had to go do some temping to make ends meet when the credit crunch kicked in, and only gave that up a few months ago. It's the tax, the tax I tell ya!

Well.. good luck to all who are in this situation. The wheels of the big machine could sure do with some oil.

[bbunlock]

Hi m0thman

I hope we both get it sorted with google soon, I am not looking forward to being unemployed and having to claim benefits

and it has been the same with me since the credit crunch, hardly made enough to keep myself employed and have dipped right into my savings to keep afloat, now dont have anywhere near enough to keep afloat without adsense

I remember the days when google were quick to respond to things like this for the publisher, bring back the good old days lol

regards

wayne

[Leonard0]

Google is so big on automation I'm surprised they don't provide a link to submit the offending page for re-evaluation once it has been corrected (or removed).

[m0thman]

They do provide you with a form. However, the process still seems to be extremely slow.

[Broadway]

Do the "disabled" emails only come to your regular contact email address, or do you see them on the Adsense reports home page too?

[snickles121]

I feel bad for you guys, but did you change anything recently before being banned? And when was the last time you did anything out of usual?

[bbunlock]

@Broadway the email they sent me was also in my adsense account so I imagine they do that for all puplishers that get the email

@snickles121, the one thing I did do was change the site design a couple of weeks earlier, the new design had less ad units on the page (designed for people not adsense)

however I think that may have been what drew attention to the add in question as less ads on the page ment the ad I had left was getting more attention then before?

kind of a strange feeling designing a site to be more for visitors than adsense only to find it may have been the reason it drew attention?

also I must point out that the ad that was left was no different than the previous deign, it was in the same place, size etc

and to top it off I still havnt heard anything from adsense in regards to my request to have ad serving re-enabled

regards

wayne

[Lucky_Ray]

In the interest of fairness, since I reported one of my accounts being disabled on the 19th, I have to announce: I've been reinstated! Yayyyyyy! Got an e-mail yesterday morning, as brief as the first one:

Hello,
Thank you for making the requested changes to your site in order to comply with our policies. We have now re-enabled ad serving to your site.

Please note that because ad serving to your site was temporarily disabled, there may be a delay of up to 48 hours or more before ads begin appearing on your site again. We appreciate your patience.

----------------------------------------------
The only action I took was correcting the ad formats so that they didn't blend with the content as well and then submitted (once) an appeal. Eleven days. Not bad. :)

[Lame_Wolf]

Well done, Lucky_Ray. However, you must have "over-blended" the adverts. [If there is such a word].

[snickles121]

well done

[bbunlock]

nice to hear that Lucky_Ray I just came here myself to update my situation to say that my ad serving is also now enabled (got the email a few mins ago) however I didnt get a reply from the form that I filled in but got a reply from the adsense help forum (http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/AdSense/label?lid=54d50ee038a93e84&hl=en) hope the link to adsense forum is ok

my email was a little more personal touch as it was a reply to my post on the adsense forum but the same 24 to 48 hours was stated

feel so much better now :)

wayne

[snickles121]

Im glad to hear that!

[m0thman]

Lucky_Ray, you're lucky indeed and glad to hear your good news.

I've been down since the 5th of August and still haven't heard anything yet even though I sorted the problem out within an hour. Still patiently waiting....

[m0thman]

I wonder how they re-check the sites that have had ads disabled. One would have thought the queue would be processed in a chronological order, there again it could be in a more self-serving order such as a the amount of revenue the site has generated in the past. Shame we're between AdSense Advisors because these questions could do with some answers.

[bbunlock]

@m0thman I have to admit that I got no responce from the form that I submited to have the ads re-enabled, I got help via the adsense forum at google

I would recomend you try poping over there for some help and ask other to check that your site is indeed clear, if it wasnt for the help from an advanced memeber on there I would probably still be waiting for a reply to the form

hope this helps

wayne

[m0thman]

Thanks Wayne

I'll give that a go. AdSense was my main income and silly me - I relied on one site. Looking at temping jobs next week to put bread on the table.

Not looking for sympathy by the way. It's my fault that I missed an inappropriate user comment... It's just a hard lesson to learn.

[Lame_Wolf]

It's my fault that I missed an inappropriate user comment... It's just a hard lesson to learn.

I wouldn't say that it was your fault.
IMO Google should be able to tell what was added by the webmaster, and what was added by a user.

And I am surprised that they still haven't allowed you back in, for what is a trivial matter. Yet they will allow someone else back in after they were banned for asking people to click on their adverts ABOVE every block of adverts.

AND had up to 21 adsense blocks per page.

Doesn't make sense.

[Lucky_Ray]

Lame Wolf,

I suppose I did overblend. I thought that was legal, sort of. :)

At least I saw that advice in a lot of places. Oh--I should point out that it wasn't to the point that you couldn't tell --a reader could easily see that it was an ad and not part of the content. I've seen some pages which were downright deceitful and weaved multiple ads between text. On my pages, it was just one large rectangle at the top of a column of the same width. The content of the column was text (not links) but it was of the same color and there weren't any borders on the ad so it did blend somewhat.

[Lucky_Ray]

bbunlock,
I'm glad you're encouraged. I guess there IS hope. I was really surprised to receive that notification. After reading all the comments here, I had resigned myself to living a life without adsense.

[m0thman]

Well tomorrow's a new "working" week so who knows. I've resigned myself to doing some job hunting though as the bills have to be paid and I'm down a month's income now. Been pressing on with some other projects but they're not paying off yet and I'm sure I'll look back on this some time down the line and wonder what was I thinking.

[bwnbwn]

After reading these post I have disabled adsense on an article submit site we own as I can't trust the article approvers to catch everything, and the links within the articles could become bad links so I figured it best to protect our account.

I hate you guys are in the fix your in and hope soon your able to get back into business.

[m0thman]

Still no response yet and the AdSense help forums didn't get me anywhere either. I'm officially starting a min-wage temp job tomorrow (not the kind of person to sit around with my thumb up my rear!) Have to pay the bills somehow.

[bbunlock]

@m0thman

It took 2 weeks for me to get a responce from a google staff memeber on the forums but I was lucky because a senior helper (NOT STAFF) was trying to help and im sure she flaged my post for review by a staff memeber

I would certaiinly keep at the forums and try and get some input/feedback from people there regarding your site and the changes you have made as that is what I did

I asked people to check to see if the changes I had made were up to scratch and also if they could see anything else I may need to do, I was lucky enough to get help from a senior helper and I imagine thats the only reason I got back in after she flaged the account

I got no responce at all from the form I submitted to have ads re-enabled on the site so I would certainly keep at the forum and if you see a senior helper respond to your thread I would engage in a conversation for help with that memeber and ask for help and advise regarding your situation

It helped me a lot and I hope the advice here helps you also

best of luck

regards

wayne

[Lame_Wolf]

m0thman, you may want to ask Adsense why they allowed someone back in, when they were asking people to click on their links. (Above every block of adverts).

Your "crime" is far less serious.

If you need screenprints, PM me.

[m0thman]

Hi Wayne: Have left at least a couple of msgs on the AdSense help pages and each time I've been told, nothing can be done, just have to wait and there's "no way to speed up appeals" by a top contributer called PeggyK

Lame_Wolf: I guess I'm a bit wary of being a pest and nagging all the time. There's no justice eh?

I just wish we had an AdSense Advisor on here still who could shed some light on the process?

[m0thman]

Wayne: I've chipped in on the thread you started off on the AdSense help pages. We'll see how that goes. Keeping fingers x'd now.

[ziajunu]

They have disabled you directly? or sent an alert email to remove ads from those pages, within 2/3 business days ?

[m0thman]

Wayne, Gracey's asked a pro to take a look - so hopefully that'll happen in a few days.

Knackered after a long week of picking and packing for minimum wage - I so miss my AdSense earnings.

[Swanny007]

m0thman, no offense, but let this be a lesson to AdSensers everywhere. Definitely save up about 6-12 months' worth of living expenses in case something like this happens. I see you had to get a minimum wage job after a month to pay the bills, sorry to hear that.