What to do when Google suspends you?
October 3, 2005 6:52 PM Subscribe
Google thinks I'm cheating them, what should I do?
I like the AdSense program. Makes some modest revenue, and is relatively nice and unobtrusive. I've been using it on my site for several months now with little activity, until recently I've had quite the traffic surge. Nearly half of all the revenue I've accrued has been in the last week. Until Google disabled my account. I don't know of anything illicit going on beyond having a really good week. I emailed Google about it, but I doubt I'll ever hear back from them. What should I do? Should I try opening another AdSense account, or is there some analog that might be better to experiment with?
I like the AdSense program. Makes some modest revenue, and is relatively nice and unobtrusive. I've been using it on my site for several months now with little activity, until recently I've had quite the traffic surge. Nearly half of all the revenue I've accrued has been in the last week. Until Google disabled my account. I don't know of anything illicit going on beyond having a really good week. I emailed Google about it, but I doubt I'll ever hear back from them. What should I do? Should I try opening another AdSense account, or is there some analog that might be better to experiment with?
From what I've heard - they can be kind of knee-jerk about disabling accounts, but are generally good about enabling them again if you seem honest and cooperative.
I would make an honest effort to make sure that nothing shady did happen (maybe a friend got bored and thought he'd try and help you by clicking 100 ads) in your server logs and see where it goes from there.
From what I've heard/read on forums back when I was first getting started with AdSense (sorry I don't have the link anymore, i've since had a hard drive crash and not really gone to look for it again) - they're pretty good about that stuff so long as you seem to be making an honest effort to help them investigate the issue.
posted by twiggy at 7:05 PM on October 3, 2005
I would make an honest effort to make sure that nothing shady did happen (maybe a friend got bored and thought he'd try and help you by clicking 100 ads) in your server logs and see where it goes from there.
From what I've heard/read on forums back when I was first getting started with AdSense (sorry I don't have the link anymore, i've since had a hard drive crash and not really gone to look for it again) - they're pretty good about that stuff so long as you seem to be making an honest effort to help them investigate the issue.
posted by twiggy at 7:05 PM on October 3, 2005
Response by poster: It's honestly been a good week ... we were linked to from two rather prominent Peak Oil/primitivist sites (Matt Savinar & Ran Prieur) within days of each other, and it looks like we've been retaining almost all of it.
OK, so I'll give them some time to get back to me and see if we can work this out then. I may very well have a dumb friend like you said, twiggy....
posted by jefgodesky at 7:20 PM on October 3, 2005
OK, so I'll give them some time to get back to me and see if we can work this out then. I may very well have a dumb friend like you said, twiggy....
posted by jefgodesky at 7:20 PM on October 3, 2005
Show those two links to them, and your previous weeks logs, so they know that those two links made the hits spike.
posted by fionab at 7:35 PM on October 3, 2005
posted by fionab at 7:35 PM on October 3, 2005
There was another similar thread and I'll say what I said then....Forget email if it's serious business. Google gets tons of emails - send your reasoned response concerning the suspension, and request for re-reinstatement, by FedEx. It gets their attention much quicker and they take it more seriously seeing that YOU are taking it seriously.
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posted by Independent Scholarship at 9:43 PM on October 3, 2005
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posted by Independent Scholarship at 9:43 PM on October 3, 2005
Response by poster: Well, to put a conclusion on this (of sorts), they say they've "confirmed" the invalid clicks, but I still have no idea what they could've been. They refuse to let me have any information whatosever on what manner of "invalid clicks" they found, so I'm at a loss as to how I might prove my innocence, when I don't even know what I'm accused of. Yesterday I put in to see if I could get into the Yahoo Publisher Network beta, but I've yet to hear back on that. Worst case scenario, I just wait till the end of the year and join YPN when it goes public.
posted by jefgodesky at 3:27 PM on October 8, 2005
posted by jefgodesky at 3:27 PM on October 8, 2005
Response by poster: Final conclusion: Google stopped answering my emails and letters, and I was accepted into the YPN beta.
posted by jefgodesky at 7:05 AM on October 19, 2005
posted by jefgodesky at 7:05 AM on October 19, 2005
This thread is closed to new comments.
Don't bother trying to open another AdSense account. What would be the point? If you sign up with other information in an attempt to trick them into taking you on as a client again, you're already breaking the rules.
Also, I'd take a look at my logs if I were you. "Really good week" should be reflected in a surge in referrers from a specific site or two, or a very active visiting host or IP range, or a lot of suspect traffic coming from a strange country, or an unusual amount of traffic from hosts all with the same weird user agent. If they could see patterns in the clicking, then you should be able to see patterns in your traffic.
posted by Mo Nickels at 7:05 PM on October 3, 2005