I Lost My AdSense Account. Should I Buy Another One (as seen in Google AdWords ads)?

I used to think Google was awesome. I joined their AdSense program in 2006 and made sure the sites I used it on were 100% complying with their TOS. I was sure people who got banned from AdSense did something wrong which they didn’t want to share publicly. I never thought I’d ever get banned if I make my sites comply with Google’s Webmaster Quality Guidelines and program policies.

In April this year I got an email message with the subject “Your Google AdSense account has been disabled“. I thought it was a bad joke. This is the message:

Hello, We continually review all publishers according to our programme
policies (https://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/answer.py?answer=48182&stc=aspe-3pp-en_GB&hl=en_gb) and Terms and Conditions (https://www.google.com/adsense/localized-terms?&stc=aspe-3tc-en_GB&hl=en_GB). During a recent review of your account, our specialists found that it
was not in compliance with our policies.

WEBMASTER GUIDELINES: Our programme specialists regularly review sites in
the AdSense programme. We have reviewed your site, <SAMPLE_URL> , and found
that it is not a good fit for the AdSense programme at this time.

It is important for a site displaying AdSense to offer significant value
to the end user by providing unique and relevant content, and not to place
ads on sites with little to no original content. Additionally, Google ads
may not be placed on non-content-based pages.

Your site should also provide a good user experience through clear
navigation and organisation. Users should be able to easily click through
your pages and find the information that they are seeking.

Because your site violates the spirit of our policies, we have disabled ad
serving to the site.

For more information, please review our programme policies
(https://www.google.com/adsense/policies?hl=en_GB) and Google’s Webmaster Quality Guidelines (http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769&hl=en_GB#quality).

As a result, your AdSense account has been disabled.

In addition, as stated in our Terms and Conditions, publishers who have
breached this agreement may not receive further payment. The earnings on
your account will be returned to the affected advertisers. Please note
that this step was taken in an effort to protect the interests of our
AdWords advertisers and to maintain the quality of the AdSense programme.

Thank you for your understanding.

Yours Sincerely,

The Google AdSense Team

So my site, <SAMPLE_URL>, was not good enough anymore.

Dear Google AdSense Team, I DO NOT HAVE A “<SAMPLE_URL>” SITE!!!

Being sure it was some misunderstanding, I thought I should appeal. As I wanted my appeal letter to be as detailed and as clear as possible, I spent a couple of days on it, but before I even got the chance to send it, I got a similar email message from The Google AdSense Team, concerning the AdSense account of a business I manage. The second message was also indicating that my site, <SAMPLE_URL>, is not a good fit.

Additionally, there have been a number of follow up emails from Google saying I need to review my flash games website AdSense placements which may be generating accidental clicks. I do not have any flash games websites.

Still being sure it was a mistake, I appealed. I used the form Google makes available for people in my situation. After sending the appeal, I got led to a thank you page stating that my appeal will be reviewed within 24 hours and that, due to the big number of inquiries, it might take a few days until I hear back from The Google Team. I am a kind person. I respect and trust what people say. I didn’t want to bother the Google AdSense Team, so I waited.

… and waited… and waited… OMG! And waited… Nothing happened.

I appealed again. Still I got no answer. I posted about my issue in the Google Help forums: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/AdSense/thread?tid=43070712fe46fa6a&hl=en. My post attracted a few people who were willing to help, but who had nothing to do with Google, so the Google Help forum turned out to be useless.

I then started something that Matt Cutts would call a 30 Day Challenge: I sent a new appeal to Google every three or four days. It was all a waste of time and energy. Nobody at Google ever bothered to acknowledge they got my letter, nor did they care to give me an answer.

Can You Trust Google?

As Aaron Wall said, the answer to the “can you trust Google” question is yes. “The long answer is you can *always* expect Google to do what is in the best interest of Google. “
(http://www.seobook.com/can-you-trust-google)

I thought about what might have been so upsetting for the Google AdSense Team, that they felt like kicking me out in such a rude manner. One thing I did was to follow their optimization advice (some of it, anyway). They provide a heat map for AdSense publisher, so you can see which are the best locations on a page for inserting the ads:

AdSense heatmap (or "Where to place your ads to get banned faster")

The darker the color on the map, the better the position. I gave Google the best spot on my website, just above the primary content. I decided to use only one ad block, although I could have used much more, as per the optimization instructions I repeatedly got from their support team. Some of you might think I was getting a CTR as high as 20% with ads displayed in that location. That’s far from what I was really getting, which was less than 2% on my main site and anyway less than 10% on the others.

I believe my site is interesting and useful (most articles, anyway). I mean, if you need to give pills to your cat and you can’t do it, wouldn’t this article help? It surely did help all those people who said thanks in the comments. Or if you don’t know how to remove unwanted items from your photos, wouldn’t you say this article was useful?
Or if you need to slice up cell contents in Microsoft Excel, wouldn’t you love to find this article of mine? I’m sure you would, because it could save you many hours of your life, hours which I spent trying to accomplish the same task.

Anyway, we live in a free world (or so we like to believe), therefore Google can do whatever they want with their AdSense program. They can choose to be honest, fair, respectful, they can choose to “do no evil” and treat their partners with consideration. This would require, though, more than kicking out publishers by sending them automated letters containing vague things such as “your <SAMPLE_URL> site”. It would require a real team, made of real people, properly trained and knowledgeable, not a robot that some day decides such and such websites are a threat to AdWords customers, without any human at Google ever looking to see if those pages are indeed as bad as the algorithm decided.

What Bothers Me About Losing My AdSense Account

I’m bothered that I’ll never see the 800 Euro Google owes me for hosting their ads on my sites for a month and 12 days. How can anybody be sure they returned the money to AdWords clients whose ads were clicked from my websites?

I’m bothered that the suspension of my personal AdSense account triggered the suspension of the business account I used to manage. I can understand that when you’re as big as Google you have to be as effective as you can. However, when thinking about their 30 billion USD profit per year, doesn’t that sound a bit too greedy to automate the banning machine gun just because it saves you money? How expensive can a team of real people be? Even if that’s 5 billion per year, we are still left with a profit of 25 billion. Not too bad, huh? But why bother, when small publishers like me, in far away countries, would most probably never sue Google, just because the logistics are too complicated and expensive?

I’m bothered that there is an appeal form available for publishers who lost their AdSense accounts. If you know no human is reading those appeals anyway, why have a form at all??? Maybe because our time isn’t worth too much in Google’s eyes…

I used to think AdSense was one of the best methods of monetizing web properties. The reason was that the ads were contextual, therefore possibly useful for readers who needed more info than I had on my pages. This is why I chose them over affiliate banners or other types of advertising. It’s a shame that such a good product has such a poor support system behind it. I’m sorry to say it, but AdSense (or shall we say Google?) can’t be regarded as a reliable business partner by any webmaster. Even great websites like Ask the Builder had their share of misery in their partnership with Google, as their traffic dropped after one of Google’s search algorithm updates.

This is my message to Matt Cutts (nothing personal, but since he’s the public face of Google and gives webmasters advice, I’m addressing this to him; any members of The Google AdSense Team in charge with banning accounts are invited to take it personally as well):

How would you feel if one morning your spouse left you a note that “because of your <SAMPLE_BEHAVIOUR> I decided you are no longer fit to partner with me in life, therefore I divorced you”? Wouldn’t you want to know at least what the <SAMPLE_BEHAVIOUR> was? Wouldn’t you feel entitled to have a conversation with your ex-partner?

Maybe the analogy is a bit too extreme, as I never felt like I married Google and the AdSense Team when I decided to partner with them for some of my web properties. However, it describes how I feel, so I would be happy if any of those people at Google would come across this post and comment on it.

I can understand the need for automation when it comes to giant systems like Google. What I don’t understand is the absolute lack of consideration for collateral victims caught in these filters. I only understand one thing: Google is at home with greed. Why waste money on a real support team, when there’s an endless supply of small publishers and automated banning is cheaper? Why would Google care about little Violeta who has caught her fingers in the “do no evil” machine? She’s just Publisher ID number 8624469803790445, nothing more.

Likewise, there are AdWords publishers who got their accounts suspended without prior notice and without being given any reason. Meanwhile, Google enables AdSense accounts sellers to advertise in AdWords! Here’s an interesting screenshot:

Google doesn’t allow webmasters to advertise with AdWords if their content has been stolen and duplicated on other websites. They don’t accept affiliate sites, either. However, a site like the one above, selling a “real” product, Blogger blogs with AdSense accounts attached (and with some money already in those accounts), can use AdWords to get customers. Affiliates should perhaps go out there and give people flyers at crossroads, not advertise online. Could this be because Google makes no money from other people’s affiliate businesses? I’m not saying this is how things are, I’m just wondering how good Google’s system is, since it allows such advertisements to appear.

What I Want To Achieve With This Article

I want a real person at Google to investigate my case and to get in touch with me. I want to know the <SAMPLE_URL> that caused the trouble and I want to be given a chance to fix it. I want my AdSense account reinstated.

I also want to spread the word about the way Google chooses to treat AdSense publishers. I invite all people who feel they have been unfairly treated by Google to leave their stories in the comments box, here, below. Hopefully a “flesh and blood” Googler will read them and take action.