Google AdSense account disabled - The FAQ

Now, as for all of you guys out there with banned Adsense accounts:

1. Guys that really are innocent and have nothing to do with invalid clicks or fraud, continue to read further.

2. The rest (in a much higher percentage than the earlier mentioned, I presume), just stop here and move on from my blog. Nothing interesting here.

A reinstating procedure is more like proving the AdSense team that it wasn’t you who made the fraud and you have nothing to do with any type of terms and policies breaking actions.

1. Always write your e-mails in a perfect grammar.

2. Write the letters addressing yourself to a 3rd person, without taking the manner personally.

3. Be corporate, be understanding and nice, although you are frustrated (probably). I was too.

4. Try to offer every little bit of help possible, so that the AdSense team can check all the possible variables.

5. IMHO, if you are a fairly known figure, for it’s whitehat techniques or just for it’s truly honest behavior, post your issue in a well documented, read and influential discussion forum.

6. IMHO, if you are NOT a fairly known figure, for it’s whitehat techniques or just for it’s truly honest behavior, do NOT post your situation in a forum, or any other public place.

7. Try not to spam the AdSense team with repeated e-mails sent to multiple e-mail addresses, telling them the exact same thing. If you sent it once (maximum twice) that’s all you can do. ALL the e-mails are read.

8. Do not reply to the first horrifying e-mail telling you your AdSense account has been disabled.

Why not reply ? Because the first Google AdSense Account Disabled e-mail comes from the e-mail address adsense-adclicks@google.com (which is NOT ticket based) , and because the e-mails that come to you after you use the appeal form, come from adsense-adclicks-appeal@google.com (which IS ticket based).

Use the AdSense invalid clicks appeal form. After you will get your first reply from the message sent to the appeal form, from a Google representative (they have a ticket system), you can then reply to that.

9. Try to offer them server logs, tracking and analytics logs, and any other useful information, that they can use to determine if your account got click-bombed or not.

10. Whenever you write e-mails, please try to sign your full name, telephone, mobile telephone, e-mail address, website, and so on, in the e-mail (please see the template below).

11. In the AdSense appeal form, at the e-mail part (Email Address:), always write your AdSense publisher e-mail, and not another e-mail.

12. One again, write in a polite manner, always. Polite + corporate + helpful + not spamming = success.

Below, I will give you a template of an e-mail to use:

Hello ……………………….,

It has come to our attention that invalid clicks have been generated on
the Google ads on your site(s). We have therefore disabled your Google
AdSense account. Please understand that this step was taken in an
effort to protect the interest of the AdWords advertisers.

A publisher’s site may not have invalid clicks on any ad(s), including
but not limited to clicks generated by:

- a publisher on his own web pages
- a publisher encouraging others to click on his ads
- automated clicking programs or any other deceptive software
- a publisher altering any portion of the ad code or changing the
layout, behavior, targeting, or delivery of ads for any reason

Practices such as these are in violation of the Google AdSense Terms
and Conditions and program polices, which can be viewed at:

https://www.google.com/adsense/localized-terms?hl=en_US
https://www.google.com/adsense/policies?hl=en_US

Publishers disabled for invalid click activity are not allowed further
participation in AdSense and do not receive any further payment. The
earnings on your account will be properly returned to the affected
advertisers.

Sincerely,

The Google AdSense Team

OR

Hello ……………………….,

While going through our records recently, we found that your AdSense
account has posed a significant risk to our AdWords advertisers. Since
keeping your account in our publisher network may financially damage
our advertisers in the future, we’ve decided to disable your account.

Please understand that we consider this a necessary step to protect the
interests of both our advertisers and our other AdSense publishers. We
realize the inconvenience this may cause you, and we thank you in
advance for your understanding and cooperation.

If you have any questions about your account or the actions we’ve
taken, please do not reply to this email. You can find more information
by visiting
https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=57153&hl=en_US.

Your response to the above e-mail

Hello there,

Thank you for letting me know about this click attack on my (personal/company) AdSense account.

I do not know what happened with my account (clicks, CTR etc.) since yesterday/2 days ago/3 days ago/one week ago when everything as far as stats went, seemed just fine, and followed the usual patterns (no abnormal rises in clicks).

As of this day, I can’t check my account and my stats for weird behaviors, because my account is disabled and I do not have access anymore.

I am trying to cover all the possible issues, so below I will write what I came up with about possible click attacks on my account:

- Reason 1 (ex. This guy threatened to click bomb my account). Put URL’s of forum discussions if you have them too.
- Reason 2 – server logs, that seem fine or not.
- Reason 3 etc.

But I can’t say nothing concrete about any of the above, simply because I really can’t know for sure.

What I know for sure is that I have nothing to do with invalid clicks, I never clicked my own ads and I never encouraged any other people to click on my ads.

Please tell me what are the next steps. Also let me know if there’s anything I can do or offer the AdSense team (server logs, tracking logs, history of the account, payment logs etc) to help with the faster resolve of this issue with my account.

Thank you in advance.

Kind regards,
Ayyan Muzaffarr
Company
My Address and City/Country
Office phone: +92 321 636 4020
Cell phone: +92 321 636 4020
YM!: my_id_here ; Skype: my_id_here

How to create a Google Adsense banner

First, create a Google Adsense account for your website
Go to Google Adsense Homepage and register an account,
Once you validated your account, choose Configure Adsense => Adsense for content pages,
Choose the kind of banner you want from them (theme, vertical, horizontal, size, etc.) depending on the position of the banners in your theme, you'll get a unique Adsense code,
Copy your adsense code into an empty file, and save it as adsense.html.

Second, where do you want the Google Adsense banner to be seen?
In the {BANNER} zone of your theme?
In the {BANNER} zone of your theme AND in a menu?
In a menu dedicated to Google Adsense banner?
Using a {GOOGLEAD} shortcode within your theme.php file?

Create your website Google Adsense banner

Upload the file adsense.html to your e107_images/banners/ directory,

Go to Admin -> Content -> Banners and click on Create new banner on the right,

At campaign, enter "googleadsense",
To display the banner as a menu, refer to this explanation,
For client, enter "google",
Client login/password are not necessary,
Now click the Choose banner image button, and select the adsense.html file you uploaded earlier,
Don't fill the URL(Link) section
Leave the other fields blank until you get down to the Visibility section. Select who you want to see the banner,
Click Create new banner.
The space containing your banners in your theme should now show the Google Adsense (randomly with your other banners).
Display your Google Adsense banner as a Menu
Currently, you have 2 ways to show your Google Adsense as a Menu :

1. Use the Banner Menu
When creating your banner, make sure you give the banner a unique campaign name, like "adsense_menu" or something similar,
Now go to Admin -> Content -> Menus,
Activate the menu banner into the zone you want to show your banner,
Once it's activated, select configure from the drop-down box in the menu item,
Click on the campaign you created earlier that contains your menu banner, make sure it's shown in the Selected campaigns box,
Set your preferences for display, etc., then click update menu settings,
Your banner will now be displayed in the area you activated the banner menu in.
NOTE: You must go to Admin -> Content -> Banners and click on Banner menu on the right, to select the rendering of the campaign. (That is: in a menu table or plain).

2. Create a Custom Menus/Pages
Go to Admin -> Content -> Custom Menus/Pages and click on Create new menu on the right,
Name your menu (seen in Menus section),
Title of the menu (seen by users),
Copy your Adsense code into the text section,
Activate the menu in Admin -> Content -> Menus, you can configure the visibility of the menu there.
Display your Google Adsense banner using a shortcode
You can also display your Google Adsense by using a {GOOGLEAD} shortcode inserted into the $HEADER or $FOOTER templates in your theme.php file. This method is useful if you want the ad below your normal banner area, but before the rest of the page, or inserted within your footer area :

Using a text-editor, create a new file named googlead.sc and type in the following...

return ' ';

Paste your Adsense code in between the two single quotes that you typed in, above. Your file should now look something like this...

return '
http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js">
';

You can edit the various google_xxx lines to change color values, for example, but do not change the line formatting, or google's script won't work (this is true for all the other methods above, as well).
Save the new googlead.sc file to your e107_files/shortcode/ directory.
You can now use the {GOOGLEAD} shortcode within your templates, as you would any other shortcode.

How to make your site XHTML compliant
Problems occur will using Google Adsense code as it is are with the javascript spelling.
A way to get around javascript warning is to put a var before every google_xxx of your Adsense code.

Something like this : var google_ad_client = "pub-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx";
var google_ad_width = 728;
var google_ad_height = 90;
var google_ad_format = "728x90_as";
var google_ad_type = "text_image";
then this part of your page will be XHTML compliant ;)
Retrieved from "http://wiki.e107.org/?title=Using_e107:Content:Google_Adsense_Banner"

Engaging users with policy-compliant images and video

As it's becoming easier and easier to embed videos and pictures on websites, many publishers are now enhancing their current text content with relevant videos and photos. We wholeheartedly support adding these different forms of content to improve the user experience on your site -- hey, we like watching entertaining YouTube videos too! But here's a friendly reminder about keeping our program policies in mind when you choose video and image content for your site.

Before posting videos or pictures on a page with Google ads, put yourself in an advertiser's position and consider whether you would want to have your ad displayed on the page. If your content might potentially be seen as offensive or disturbing, an advertiser may not be comfortable running their ads on that page. Here are a few specific types of content that you can check for:

Adult or mature: Includes, but is not limited to, images and videos containing sexual activity, full nudity, and lewd poses. Please review this recent post to determine whether your content might fall into this category.

Violent or gory: Can include images and videos of street-fighting, people hurting each other, or gruesome accidents and their victims.

Culturally insensitive or hate speech: Includes content promoting racial intolerance or advocating against a specific individual, group, or organization.

Also, keep in mind that publishers may not place AdSense ads on pages involved in the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted materials. Unauthorized copyrighted materials include music, movies, images, or any other copyrighted material that the publisher does not own or license from the copyright owner.

The list above is by no means exhaustive, since there are always some borderline cases which will feature content that may be tame to one person but offensive to another. If you're uncertain about specific pictures or videos, we recommend that you err on the side of caution and refrain from placing this content on pages containing Google ads. In addition, if you host a site with user-generated content, we ask that you continually monitor your network to ensure that ads don't appear alongside the types of content described here.

Google Adsense Alternatives

In this post we will discuss the alternatives to adsense and adsense alternatives.Sometimes webmasters find themselves in a position when they can no longer use google adsense, This may be because your requirements have changed, Or because you have been banned from Adsense.When this happens you need to change ad provider quickly, Every day you are without adverts is costing you money..Here i will list alternatives to adsense, and tell you a little about them.

Yahoo! Publisher NetworkYahoo have become googles main competition in the PPC service industry. They are a reliable PPC ad provider. At the moment the YPN is only available to American citizens with a valid SSN.If you can get into the YPN it's probably the best and most reliable alternative to adsense.

ClicksorAfter google adsense and Yahoo YPN, clicksor is your best bet.They have been around a while and claim to pay publishers 70% of what advertisers pay for each click.

IntellitxtIntellitxt is run by a company called Vibrant Media. These types of adverts are a little different to the regular PPC contextual adverts. Instead of displaying adblocks on your page Intellitxt puts adverts in your content by displaying a tooltip type adverts whenever your visitor mouseovers on a keyword.

TargetPointTargetPooint offers a few options to webmasters, Such as AdPoint, ExitPoint, ImagePoint, UnderPoint..AdPoint serves contextual adverts relevant to your content.ExitPoint serves adverts to visitors as they are leaving, Like a popunder..ImagePoint will display banners on your page relevant too your content.

AdBrightAdBright works slightly different to other adverts. With adbright you need to get webmasters to advertise directly on your site. So instead of leaving it to the PPC provider to display adverts, People have to like your site, want too advertise on it and sign up. Rates are said to be good though.

ChitikaChitika is a new type of advert, They are sometimes called mini malls. What makes Chitika special is the look of the adverts. It's a tabbed block that allows visitors to move around the adverts on your site. These do tend to have a lower CPC though. While this could be considered a replacement for adsense it's not really an adsense alternative because it's a different type of adverts.

BidvertiserBidvertiser is your ordinary common or garden PPC advert program. What makes it appealing is that they pay through paypal and their minimum payout is just $10. So if you are dropping adsense because you find it hard to reach the $100 mark you should give Bivertiser a go.You should be aware that it is against adsense terms (and most PPC terms) to display competing contextual adverts on the same page. You can test these providers on different pages of the same site, But not the same page.

Sign up to Google AdSense questions and answers

How can I help make sure that my application will be approved? You must be able to receive cheques made payable to the name on your AdSense application. AdSense applications with incomplete names will not be approved. For business accounts, enter the name of the organisation in the 'Payee Name' field and the person in your organisation who manages the website. Address Only AdSense applications with valid mailing addresses will be approved. Provide your complete Street Address, including house number, street name/number, flat/apartment number) City/Town County/Area Postcode, Country and Territory. The email address that you enter will be the login that you use to sign in to AdSense. You will also receive all communication regarding your AdSense account at this email address, starting with your email verification message. For this reason, make sure that you enter a valid address where you can receive email. If you enter an incorrect email address, you will need to submit a new application by clicking HERE using your desired email address..

Under Construction/Difficult Site Navigation :In order to be approved, your website must be launched and contain enough textual content for there specialists to evaluate. Websites that are under construction, that do not load or have non-functioning links will not be approved so make sure that the URL on your application is entered correctly.

Domain Ownership. You must have access to edit the HTML source code of the website that you submit for AdSense. If you submit a site that you do not own (for example, www.Google.co.uk), you will not be able to place the AdSense code on the site and your application will not be approved.

Unsupported Language Unfortunately, AdSense is not yet available for all languages. If the primary language of your website does not appear in there list of supported languages, they will be unable to approve your application.

How long does it take to have my application reviewed? Once you have submitted your AdSense application and verified your email address, it can take up-to 2-3 days for there specialists to complete the review. However, depending on the volume of applications they receive, it may take up to one week. As soon as they have reviewed your application, they will send you an email with details on your application status.

What is a verification email and what do I do if I have not received it?

Once you have applied, you will receive an email asking you to verify your email address. You must click the link in this verification email in order to confirm your email address. Until you complete this process, they will be unable to review your application for AdSense. If you have not received your verification email, it may be in the Bulk/Spam folder of your email account, so check there before requesting a replacement.

Why does the application take me back to the beginning every time I click 'Submit'. If you are taken back to the beginning of the AdSense application every time you try to submit, you may need to change your browser settings. Make sure to enable cookies and SSL 2.0 and clear your browser cache. Once you have done this, try submitting your application again. If you continue to have trouble, please contact them with a description of your issue.

I submitted the wrong email address with my application. What do I do now? If the email address that you submitted on your application contains a type error or you no longer wish to use that address for AdSense, the way to correct this issue differs based on where you were in the application process.

If you have not yet verified your email address or your application has been reviewed and disapproved, you are more than welcome to submit a new application using your desired email address. If you have verified your email address, please wait 2-3 days for your application to be reviewed. If your application is approved, follow the steps to update your login.

What if my full name does not fit in the application page? The 'Payee Name' field on the AdSense application is limited to 35 characters. If your payee name is longer than this, please enter your first initial and complete last name.

Does my site qualify for AdSense? Google AdSense and AdSense for search is open to website publishers of all sizes. make sure you read there programme policies to ensure that your content fits there guidelines. If, after reading there policies, you're not sure if your site qualifies, I suggest that you go ahead and submit an application. There programme specialists will review your site and respond within 2-3 days. If you're approved, you'll receive an email with instructions on logging in to your account and getting started with the programme.

How do I sign up for AdSense for search? if you comply with there programme policies, simply complete there online application and select AdSense for search from the Products selections. Google pays you for valid clicks on the ads on your search results pages. Existing AdSense for content publishers do not need to apply again, simply visit the AdSense Setup tab, choose AdSense for search as the product and generate the AdSense for search code.

Am I a Business or Individual account?Generally, if you are a business with 20 or more employees, you should apply as a Business account. Individual publishers, or businesses with less than 20 employees, should sign up as an Individual account.There's no difference in the services or payment structure between Individual and Business accounts. Business account payments will be made payable to the Company Name, while Individual accounts are paid out to the Payee Name of the account holder. Should you ever need to select a new account type, there specialists will work with you to close your current account and to open a new account with your updated information.

Does Google guarantee revenues? Since the revenue that you may earn through Google AdSense depends on the content of each of your web pages or the search terms entered by your users, as well as the availability of related Google ads, Google does not guarantee that you will earn any revenue amount.

Can I sign up if I am already a part of an ad network?Yes. However, they do have some guidelines as to how non-Google ads may be displayed along with Google ads. They do allow affiliate or limited-text links. If your ad network already displays Google ads on your pages, you can still join AdSense and run ads on your site through our programme. They allow publishers to display up to three standard Google ad units on any webpage. Keep in mind that it is your responsibility to work out any contractual issues that may arise with your ad network as a result of serving Google ads directly.

If I am a Google AdWords advertiser, can I sign up? Yes. they are pleased to help you find yet another way for you to increase your revenue. You can even use the same login name and password so you don't have to keep track of multiple Google logins. Editing your login information in one account will edit in the other as well.

Can I participate in AdSense for feeds? At this time, AdSense for feeds is only available in US English. When they are able to extend there product to additional languages, more details will be available at there support site.

15 Common Mistakes that Violate Google Adsense TOS

Google Adsense program is a popular web advertising program which provides a good income source for many websites. There are well defined terms of service to strictly adhere to when participating in the program.

On my visit through sites and forums, I daily notice several instances of misuse of Adsense ads. So here a few helpful Google Adsense tips, probably many you already know, and few you might gain by knowing now. These adsense faq are all picked from the Program Policies, Terms and Conditions and FAQ itself and presented in a simplified manner.

1. Never click your own adsense ads or get them clicked for whatever reason. You know this one very well. This is a surefire way to close you Adsense account. Never tell your office associates or friends to click on them. Keep a check if your family or children are busy increasing your income by clicking your ads and indirectly trying to stop your income. Dont even think of offering incentives for clicks, using automated clicking tools, or other deceptive software. Adsense is very smart to detect fraudulent clicks. Check the ads which appear on your pages by the Google Preview tool if required.

2. Never change the Adsense code. There are enough means of adsense optimization & customizations available to change the colour, background or border to suit your needs. Do whatever you want to do outside the code, never fiddle within the ad or the search code. They know it when you do. The search code has more limitations to colour and placement, but you should adhere to the rules. The code may stop working and violates the TOS.

3. Do not place more than 3 ad units and 3 ad links or 2 adsense search boxes on any web page. Anyway, ads will not appear in those units even if you place more ad units. But this is the limit they set, so it is better to stick to it.

4. Do not run competitive contextual text ad or search services on the same site which offer Google Adsense competition in their field. Never try to create link structures resembling the adsense ads. Never use other competitive search tools on the same pages which have Adsense powered Google search. They do allow affiliate or limited-text links. Update: Google has allowed you to run contextual advertising like Yahoo ads, Chitika etc provided the ads do not resemble Adsense ads.

5. Do not disclose confidential information about your account like the CTR, CPM and income derived via individual ad units or any other confidential information they may reveal to you. However, you may reveal the total money you make as per recent updates to the TOS.

6. Label headings as “sponsored links” or “advertisements” only. Other labels are not allowed. I have seen many sites label ads with other titles. Dont make your site a target in a few seconds gaze.

7. Never launch a New Page for clicked ads by default. Adsense ads should open on the same page. You may be using a base target tag to open all links in a new window or frame by default. Correct it now as they do not want new pages opening from clicked ads.

8. One Account suffices for Multiple websites. You do not need to create 5 accounts for 5 different websites. One account will do. If you live in the fear that if one account is closed down for violation of TOS, believe me they will close all accounts when they find out. You can keep track of clicks by using channels with real time statistics. They will automatically detect the new site and display relevant ads.

9. Place ads only on Content Pages. Advertisers pay only for content based ads. Content drives relevant ads. Although you might manage some clicks from error, login, registration, “thank you” or welcome pages, parking pages or pop ups, it will get you out of the program.

10. Do not mask ad elements. Alteration of colours and border is a facility to blend or contrast ads as per your site requirements. I have seen many sites where the url part is of the same colour as the background. While blending the ad with your site is a good idea, hiding relevant components of the ads is not allowed. Also do not block the visibility of ads by overlapping images, pop ups, tables etc.

11. Do not send your ads by email. Html formatted emails look good and allow placement of these javascript ads. But it is not allowed as per TOS. You do not want impressions registering on their logs from any email even once. They are watching!

12. Keep track of your content. So Adsense is not allowed on several non content pages. But it is also not allowed on several content pages too. Do not add it on web pages with MP3, Video, News Groups, and Image Results. Also exclude any pornographic, hate-related, violent, or illegal content.

13. Do not alter the results after ad clicks or searches - Ensure you are not in any way altering the site which the user reaches to after clicking the ads. Do not frame, minimize, remove, redirect or otherwise inhibit the full and complete display of any Advertiser Page or Search Results Page after the user clicks on any Ad or Search results.

14. Avoid excessive advertising and keyword stuffing - Although the definition of ‘excessive’ is a gray area and is subject to discretion, yet Google adsense with correct placement, focused content and high traffic will get you much more income than other programs, so excessive advertising is not required. Keyword stuffing does target better focused ads, but overdoing it is not required.

15. Ensure you Language is Supported - Adsense supports “Chinese (simplified), Japanese, Danish, Korean, Dutch, Norwegian, English, Polish, Finnish, Portuguese, French, Russian, German, Spanish, Hungarian, Swedish, Italian and Turkish”. In addition, AdSense for search is available in Czech, Slovak, and Traditional Chinese. If your web pages language is not supported, do not use the code on such pages.

Update:
16. Maximum 2 referral button per product per page - With the launch of the google adsense referral program, you are allowed to put only 2 referral buttons for adsense referral, adwords referral, Google pack and Firefox with google toolbar referral.

17. Do not specify Google ads as your alternate ads. - Several services like Chitika eminimalls allow you to place alternate urls, when a targeted paying ad cannot be displayed. This involved creating an simple html page and putting the ad to be displayed instead. Even Adsense allows an alternate url feature instead of displaying public service ads. But never use Adsense ads as alternate urls.

18. Do not confuse with adjacent images - It was a common policy to increase CTR by placing same number of images as the number of text ads, which falsely gave the impression that the text ads represented an explanation to these images. Inserting a small space or a line between the images and ads is not allowed. Make sure that the ads and images are not arranged in a way that could easily mislead or confuse your visitors. More.

Whenever in doubt, it is better to ask for adsense help from the learned staff of Google Adsense. They are very helpful!