Would Google mislead us about why our accounts were banned?

[internetheaven]

About four months ago, I set up my sister in this business. We share a last name, but that's it. Address, websites etc. are different as are bank accounts.

Recently she'd been having problems so I went to her house and logged into my account and hers at the same time to see whether it was her internet connection that was messing up her Adsense Account access.

I got it resolved, but 3 days later, her account was banned because:

"While going through our records recently, we found that your AdSense account has posed a significant risk to our AdWords advertisers."

2 days after that, my three-year-old account was banned for:

"We have detected invalid activity on your site and your account has been disabled."

Now, having more than one account (which Google might think was going on due to the double login) is a policy violation. I was being accused of invalid activity on my website, not a policy violation. My sister was being accused of posing a risk ... that's it.

We therefore both went through our sites thoroughly and appealed. We could find nothing wrong with her sites. With mine, one site was popping up the Adsense ad square whenever a user came from Twitter. (A flaw in our UK cookie warning script! No more than 10-20 visitors out of 20,000 a month.)

Both our appeals were rejected ... within hours ....

So was this just a really, really, really, really, really big co-incidence that we both got banned within days of logging in using the same IP address after having Adsense accounts for 3+ years and 4+ months respectively?

Because it really stinks of deceit to me. We appealed based on the reasons we were given.

[netmeg]

What would be their incentive to lie?

Did you check where your sister's traffic is coming from?

[jbayabas]

Number 1 rule of Adsense (IMO): never ever share your websites to family members or friends. Unbeknownst to you, your sister may have shared your website to her friends and other relatives. Instead of helping by clicking ads, they end up having your account disabled. A jealous friend or an ex-friend could also sabotage your account so easily if they know your website.

[littlecubpanda]

That is soooo sucky. That is a really tough spot for you and I feel for you. Your usual, predictable pattern deviated and intersected with something Google saw as "fishy".

[morningdew]

My account has been disabled recently too. It looks like that Google intentionally to do this, and gives no reason. It's disappointing.

[internetheaven]

Unbeknownst to you, your sister may have shared your website to her friends and other relatives. Instead of helping by clicking ads, they end up having your account disabled.

She is not that stupid. I put the "fear of Google" in her right from the start. I didn't realise they were this evil though. We're talking ££££s in total between the accounts. She can't pay her bills this month. If she'd had another ad block on there, then at least she'd be able to pay rent.

Eggs in one basket? Sure. But the problem with Google being made the monopoly is that you end up getting forced to having them as the only source of eggs.

What would be their incentive to lie?

For the exact reasons they publicly don't tell the truth at any other time. They are not in the truth business. They are in the secrecy business. It's not much of a leap from "we cannot tell anyone the truth because we have to protect our system" - to - "we are telling something misleading to protect our system".

[netmeg]

They've never shown any reluctance to tell people their AdSense accounts are disabled, and why. It's unlikely they'd go to the trouble over two accounts.

Eggs in one basket? Sure. But the problem with Google being made the monopoly is that you end up getting forced to having them as the only source of eggs.

There are other eggs. They're just not premium and easy eggs.

Your best bet is to try to get a sympathetic ear in the Google forum, I've heard of people being reinstated even after an appeal, but it's rare.

[jbayabas]

internetheaven, that's scary stuff if you were saying is true. If you don't mind me asking, how high was your CTR? IMO, that's usually indicative of invalid activity.

[ember]

IMO, that's usually indicative of invalid activity.

Not necessarily.

[internetheaven]

If you don't mind me asking, how high was your CTR?

Over the two accounts there were 7 websites. CTR ranged from 1% to 6% depending on the site and the season.

[internetheaven]

They've never shown any reluctance to tell people their AdSense accounts are disabled, and why. It's unlikely they'd go to the trouble over two accounts.

I think you're forgetting that you are special netmeg. The rest of us normal people just get told things like "invalid activity" or "policy violation". There are no details. No clues about even where to start.

Invalid activity, invalid clicks and policy violations could be something to do with your site, it's content, it's layout, it's referrers, it's traffic ... i.e. anything.

[netmeg]

If Google deliberately went to the trouble to mislead you and your sister as to the reasons why both of your accounts were banned, you two specifically - why, I'm not the one who's special.

[jbayabas]

CTR ranged from 1% to 6% depending on the site and the season.

That's quite high, IMO. Based in my 7 years experience, here's the rules I follow:

For daily page views of less than 2k, a CTR 1% to 6% is fine.

For daily page views of more than 2k, a CTR of more than 2% is quite high and questionable.

I have 6 sites and none gets a CTR of more than 1%. But I have very high traffic sites and earn quite well.

[internetheaven]

If Google deliberately went to the trouble to mislead you and your sister as to the reasons why both of your accounts were banned, you two specifically - why, I'm not the one who's special.

Now, now. Behave!

[IanCP]

I never saw 6%, even in the halcyon days.

When the click area was later narrowed down, 2% tops was always the highest I ever saw, and that was yonks ago.

Of course it's likely influenced by genre.

[birchy]

Number 1 rule of Adsense (IMO): never ever share your websites to family members or friends.

So, to avoid the wrath of G, we can't tell anyone we know, about our websites? I always warn them to not click on ads, but if they ignore that warning, they put me out of business? Sheesh. I feel like I did when I realized that any edits I made on WikiPedia (pre-web publishing activities) were pointless because of the wikiNazis. In the early days, if you made an edit that wasn't perfect, someone corrected it. Now, someone just deletes it and says something snide. Or a bot does it.

Thank God, Santa is real....

Guess I have to hope that I can develop fast enough to switch over to a business model where I compete with Google, by selling my adspace directly to the advertisers.

[birchy]

You know, I'm learning about these things pretty late in the game and I had done at least a little homework. Is this crap not being blogged about because they are afraid that G will retaliate?

[netmeg]

No, it's not blogged about because it's pretty much been this way since AdSense opened its doors. Everything is weighted to Google's and the Advertisers' advantage, and very little to the Publisher's. The devil's deal we all make is that we have virtually no control over what happens, in exchange for Google selling the ad space, collecting the money and paying us on time. They can cut us off with no notice. (And we can drop them with no notice too) There *are* other ad networks, that don't tend to pay as well, and of course selling direct ads is the best possible scenario - but it's a lot more work.

This business model works for Google, that's why they don't significantly alter it. And there's no real incentive for them to alter it, so it's not surprising they're not interested in altering it.