Banned over 7-year-old deleted ad that sent one click.

[luke175]

So after weeks I've finally received the reason why my account was suspended.

I've had the account for 11 years with a six-figure spend.

In 2004 I created one campaign for a health-related ad for a BOOK.

I sent ONE click to this site, but deleted it shortly after as it was not generating any traffic.

Then, in 2011 they banned me for that one click to a site that I have no control over...and are telling me they will only reinstate my account if I change this site (which I don't own!)

So...
1. Create ad while Google allows it
2. Delete said ad
3. 7 years later get banned

That's pretty much it.

[Leosghost]

Press release at the time from their site..
[autoritedelaconcurrence.fr...]

AFAIK there is not an English translation of the avis10d30. ..But I can phone and ask them, probably won't have a reply for you either way til next week as I'm busy til and including this coming weekend and next Monday is a holiday here.

I've downloaded the pdf...at a quick glance not all of it needs translation ..for the sections re "notice" and "warnings" and "adequate time" that you are interested in ..seems that only a few paragraphs speak directly about it ..however it is 24 pages ..and I don't have time to go through it all now ..I'll sticky you next week .

[luke175]

Thanks for the press release link; that was actually very informative.

I would think that if any advertisers in France are dealing with similar issues that they would be in a strong position to file a complaint.

[Leosghost]

I would think that if any advertisers in France are dealing with similar issues

I've been looking, for about 20 minutes there on the Francophone web, using a variety of search terms equivalent to "adwords closed my account" etc ..and can find only 3 cases of people complaining tht adwords shut their accounts.

One guy in Morocco who was running arbitrage to his blog ( ran adsense on it used adwords and facebook to bring traffic ) and linking to adult videos.

And one in metro ( mainland France ) ..again running adwords / adsense arbritrage ) ..and who admitted to clicking on the adsense ads.*

And a french guy in Greece again running arbitrage and who admitted to clicking on adsense ads on his site "to test them"*..

Apart from those three, all I can find in French language refers to the NavX case, ( as in just reports about it )..or is translations of cases in the USA..

Of course my search was not exhaustive ...and there are others here from France ..maybe someone else has heard ..bear in mind that France has no equivalent of WebmasterWorld ..and no dedicated webmaster forums as such, that are not part of other sites as sub fora ..

I also searched in Google's own support fora in French and only the two cases marked* showed up ..( doesn't mean there are not more ..doesn't mean there are ) ..but I didn't see any more.

Maybe outside of the English speaking world and/or in particular the USA, it just isn't happening or is not a problem ?

As I don't use adwords I woudn't know .. I read the threads and have commented in the past on QS ( which strikes me as "smoke and mirrors"..paying more to run your ad can improve the quality score ;-) )..but had not heard of this particular circumstance until you posted.

[jecasc]

Problem is, that such agreements between companies and public authorities usually only are valid in the particular country. Competition and Anti Trust regulations in Europe are regulated on a european level and then put into local laws in the different countries. So what is true in France would probably be true in any other European country and if you were located in Europe a complaint to local or EU authorities could indeed help.

Since you are in the US I would check if similar regulations apply there.

Are you a member of any business association like chamber of commerce? I had legal trouble once with another company and they were able to mediate in that matter. I don't know however if they operate the same way in the US like here where I live were they provide legal council to members and help in disputes.

My experience is: Between simply backing of in disputes and legal action there is often a not so obvious third way for solving conflicts.

[vetofunk]

2 years ago out site was banned as we were spending 6 figures per year. We actually had a Google Team that helped run our account and actually set up 75% of it. Then we were banned, our Google Adwords team was like...sorry it was the Policy Team...and that was the end of it...no more advertising, no more Google Adwords team.