People often ask me for help when it comes to dealing with disabled AdSense accounts and preventing click fraud. So I did some digging over the weekend.
You may not realize it, but Google has quite a bit of documentation on these topics to help AdSense publishers keep their accounts in good standing.
Preventing Invalid Activity
While there’s nothing you can do to completely protect your account from sabotage, the following article has some tips and guidelines that may help you guard against invalid click activity.
Pay special attention to the tip about “partnering with untrusted websites.” They used the example of paying for traffic from questionable sources.
Often times these services send artificial traffic via bots which can generate false impressions and clicks on your ads. That’s a surefire way to get banned from AdSense.
Always do your homework before signing up with any “traffic generation service.” If it isn’t clear how they are generating the traffic to your website, that should always raise red flags.
Notice Anything Suspicious?
Google encourages you to monitor your traffic logs, and if you notice any reports that indicate suspicious IP addresses, referrers or requests, complete this form.
Analytics does not provide visitor IP information, but you can use a service like PIWIK or the WordPress StatCounter plugin to obtain such information. Your web hosting control panel should also provide more detailed log info should you need to research visitor information.
A lady once told me she was able to get her AdSense account reinstated after producing a report with her appeal that showed a pattern of suspicious activity from an IP address on the day she was banned.
How to Appeal Your Disabled Account
Let’s face it. Sometimes Google gets it wrong and disables accounts owned by people who were playing by the rules. If you feel your account has been wrongfully disabled, you can appeal using this form.
“AdSense is a Scam!”
People often claim AdSense is a scam when their accounts become disabled.
AdSense is far from being a scam. Google actually wants AdSense Publishers to succeed because the more quality, relevant websites their advertisers have access to, the more revenue Google can potentially earn.
That’s why they have an AdSense Optimization Team — a task force dedicated to helping publishers maximize their earnings so Google can ultimately earn more.
My point is, Google really has nothing to gain by disabling AdSense accounts for “no good reason.” So I’ve never understood the scam complaints I often receive in the comments of my YouTube videos.
If Google disabled your account, it’s because they believe there’s a risk or evidence it has produced invalid clicks — which is not fair to their advertisers.
You have to realize that the AdWords advertisers are Google’s customers and top priority — not us, the AdSense publishers.
If they suspect click fraud or notice any strange patterns with our AdSense accounts, they will do what is necessary to ensure their advertiser’s money is not being wasted on invalid clicks.
Unfortunately this sometimes results in people’s accounts getting wrongfully disabled. That is why they allow you to appeal.
At the end of the day, Google is doing what’s best for their business and that is protecting their top revenue source — which is the AdWords advertisers.
It’s impossible to protect your account 100% of the time, but if you follow the guidelines on the articles above, you can minimize the chances of your account becoming disabled.
Lisa soon or later your Google Adsense account will be disabled. Why because you are displaying Adsense ads on 404 error page which is i think against the terms and condition of Adsense policies.
Thanks for helping us avoid getting banned, Lisa.
The main thing that I hate about adsense is that my account could be disabled anytime without any notice… and that’s not really fair.
I would agree to get less or no money if in some days something seems suspicious about my account, or to have some url channels disabled if the AdSense team thinks that those sites are suspicious or contain content that is not allowed by adsense.
Their way to handle things is not so good. They don’t care that much about the publishers. I could go to sleep with 1000$ in my adsense account and wake up with my adsense account disabled and there’s not that much that I can do about it.
I have not faced this issue. But it better to consider this point. Thanks for sharing the reporting link.
Nice post.
I should have read this post a few days ago when my adsense was banned
nice post, I want to ask that why google adsense account disabled immediately but if I look at my web master of the average visit to my blog from search engines, and that amazes me google sends the message that on my blog click the gathering place and it’s not my do. Approximately what suggestions do you like? please see my blog what was relevant with google adsense? and what should I do?
Great post, Lisa. Too many people get kicked out of Adsense and a lot of them don’t even seem sure of the reason. Better off being protective.
I agree with you Lisa, google want their publisher more qualified to make satisfied their advertizer. So we must improve our blog quality
Hi Lisa, This is my second comment on this post yesterday i commented here and that time i had an adsense account,but today in the morning when i woke up and logged in to my adsense account. instead of going to my adsense dashboard i was redirected to the a page with a message that your account has been disabled due to invalid click activity 🙁 but i was not involved in that 🙁 yesterday a guy asked me to send him my template and so i gave him my template including my publisher id, unknowingly that his site is banned from adsense 🙁 and now my account has been banned too can you tell me what i can do to get my account back because adsense was the only source of my income and i was totally relied on it and dont have any backup, please help 🙁
Sorry about that. Go to that appeal link I mentioned in this post and explain that story to them.
Thanks i filled that appeal form 🙂 and lisa can you tell me adsense alternatives i can use 🙂
That was interesting article i appreciate that, first we need to should don’t rush we clicking own ads so stupid people Google says that they will ban if they see that the growth rate of a website is not natural. when their site doesn’t have enough traffic to make much money anyway.Thanks
There are allot of advices and hopefully great.
Thank you Lisa, it´s great article that cleared alot about adsense for me 🙂
great post….it covers almost all ways to prevent someones adsense account frm being banned and really the bitter truth is that there’s no way to completely secure your account from being banned 🙁 Thanks lisa for the great post 🙂
This is so helpful Lisa! It is true that Google adsense might be a double-edged sword for a blogger, especially a new one that has the zeal to succeed quickly and eagerly expecting to reach his or her goals/expectations. I totally agree with your point of view. Thank you for sharing your experience and giving us all these brilliant advices.
Thanks for the post. I was disabled from adsense for click fraud. Someone went on my website and click bombed me. I am in the process of fighting it now. I hope it goes well.
Once mY adsense was banned because of invalid click activity which was done by some bad guy but then I used appeal form and got back my account within a week.
The truth is that I think Adsense is to become unpredictable.
Cierrra accounts without clear reasons, and without explanation.
Sometimes you lose so much work in just a few seconds
Thank-you for the insight. Panda pounded my sites pretty badly and I can’t afford to take the hit of an interuptence in Adsense. I look at my logs fleetingly, now will look at more rigorously.
Thats so funny that people think AdSense is a scam. How could they not realize that disabling an account is harming Google because they can no longer make revenue off that account. People can be dumb sometimes. lol
It’s amazing how many people who join AdSense don’t really understand what drives the program. They act as if Google is just handing out money or they owe them something. Google is inviting us in as partners and they won’t keep any account that risks them losing business.
Just to add to what I have written above – I have another thought since it is so difficult to even start off with Adsense for people like me. Why not work a little harder and give out space to private ads with a well ranked site? Instead of losing your regular income after ten years like someone wrote above, you can be self dependent by implementing media buying techniques on your sites. Even affiliate marketing will be good if you target your audience well. For example if you have a site pertaining to vanity, you can easily advertise for beauty products and earn a good affiliate income. Adsense may be easiest and most evolved but if you become really enterprising you can earn even better that what Adsense offers and also not be at the mercy of the big G.
People have a tendency to charge into things, like starting blogs or signing up for sites like WebAnswers and they never bother to read the TOU and get familiar with the rules. When you sign up for Adsense, they expect you to understand the rules. If you didn’t take the time to do that, and you get caught breaking the rules, you are done for. There is nothing you can do about it.
Thanks for the great tips Lisa. As you may know, my account has been disabled from September and I still haven’t got my appeal to be accepted as yet.
I will still try again though, because I love Google Adsense.
A lot of people are able to get back in so hopefully you will as well!
Hey Lisa,
I actually had my adsense account of 10 years disabled just a couple months ago. The irony was I was only using it with ad revenue sharing websites like hubpages (I was using HP for SEO and figured I may as well drop my publisher’s id in it).
What many people don’t uI just left a comment on How to Minimize Your Chances of AdSense Click Fraud and Getting Banned at 2 Create a Website – The Blognderstand when it comes to ad revenue sharing websites (and what I didn’t think about) is that if you don’t have access to IP logs, you have absolutely no way to protect yourself.
Exactly. Having access to your logs can help defend yourself. I’m so sorry to hear about you losing your account, Leo!
Hi Lisa,
I am just starting to see a small income from Adsense, I believe that with all the latest updates affiliate links will become harder and harder to earn from, for me Adsense is the way forwards. Thanks for the resources on how to protect our accounts
Google does not tolerate click fraud,…period. People have a tendency to charge into things, like starting blogs or signing up for sites like WebAnswers and they never bother to read the TOU and get familiar with the rules. When you sign up for Adsense, they expect you to understand the rules. If you didn’t take the time to do that, and you get caught breaking the rules, you are done for. There is nothing you can do about it.
many bloggers are facing the problem of click fraud.It is a serious problm in the case of google adsense.Many of them lost their adsense account because of click fraud…good post about this.Thank you
I was the victim of AdSense block but somehow managed to retrieve it again…
When I got mail from Google about illegal clicking activity and blocking of my adsense account ,I wasn’t sure what i can do but ,I have fill up the form couple of times and they reactivated my account…I think it was pure luck …i guess!!!!
I started my first blog 2 years ago and decided to apply for Adsense. To my surprise my application got rejected. The response said – Thank you for your interest in Google AdSense. After reviewing your application, our specialists have found that it does not meet our program criteria. Therefore, we are unable to accept you into our program. We have certain policies in place that we believe will help ensure the effectiveness of Google ads for our publishers as well as for our advertisers. We review all publishers, and we reserve the right to decline any application. As we grow, we may find that we are able to expand our program to more web publishers with a wider variety of web content. Please note that we may not be able to respond to inquiries regarding the specific reasons for our decision. Thank you for your understanding.
I consulted someone who is an expert at Adsense and she said that this kind of disapproval usually means that Google is not interested in doing business with me. It doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the web site.
Although I am disappointed I wish to give my wife a chance – she also has a few sites of her own and wishes to apply for Adsense. Problem is, that we share the same internet connection. I am ready to request an IP change through my BB service provider and delete my Adsense account – in fact all my Google accounts so that my wife gets a chance. Is it possible?
I don’t think it matters that you share the same internet connection, even if you have a static IP – do you have a static IP? That is quite unusual, normally, here in the UK anyway, you have to ask your ISP specifically to get a static IP and pay extra for your service. Most people, by default, have an IP that is dynmically assigned by their ISP, that is it is assigned on an ad hoc basis so it would change periodically, certainly if you rebooted your router. Anyways, IP isn’t really what you’re interested in.
If users are banned they are banned, period. They cannot reapply and get an Adsense account, but banned users aren’t identified by their IP address, they’re identified by their name, dob, email address, bank account etc.
So 2 things here: A) You weren’t banned, you simply weren’t accepted so you are free to reapply anyway. B) your wife can apply with different name, email address, bank account etc.
So, happy days :-), you’re all good.
Oooppsss, forgot tto add the link. Lisa, can you please delete that earlier post? Here’s the new post with the video response link:
Hey Lisa! I greatly appreciate your post that tries to help people avoid getting banned, but the reality is a lot are already banned. You also have no actually lived through getting that warning AND THEN getting banned, so I thought I’d add a few things I felt you left out of your post.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwLCoIiyg7c
I told you I’d be back! 😉
Google Adsense support also recommends you try to avoid excessive browser refreshes of your site pages. This is because some ads are impression-based rather than click-based. It is perfectly fine to copy the URL being featured in an Adsense ad and enter this directly into your browser, because this will not result in any costs to the advertiser. This is the recommended action to take if you are actually interested in following up an ad because you are interested in what it offers. There is also an Adsense Preview tool you can download for Internet Explorer. This lets you view the ads that will appear on any given page on your site once Adsense has been inserted. If you notice unusual click activity on your account and fear that this may be due to invalid clicks by someone else, you are asked to fill in an Invalid Clicks Form on the Adsense support site.
I have been using adsense for a few years now and luckily I have no problems with it. How ever I have several friends who havent been so lucky. I do know if you get banned, your just wasting your time appealing because more often then not, it wont make a difference. Guard your income with care people.
Google always monitor our websites. as we are taking about Google Ad-sense account when we put Ad-sense code to our website that time Google read our IP address. If we click on our Ad-sense through our IP they will not pay any money and we promote our Ad-sense like banner adds its also the reason of ban. There is so many reasons Google for ban any Ad-sense account.
we should promote our website URL. the more our website will popular the we can earn.
Thanks
Yes you are right Fred Ad-sense always monitor our website and IP address as well. If your website have good traffic one thing is important that is your quality articles.
well, I suggest every blogger not to worry much about adsense these days. Coz we have plenty of alternative way of earning from a blog once it gets decent traffic. BUt yes, adsense always been the top priority. but adsense is not everything. the ideas that Lisa suggested are really good and helps to prevent adsense from being disabled. because, prevention is better than cure.
I love how you put it Lisa: how to ‘MINIMIZE your chances’. The agreement any publisher signs with Google gives Google a lot of freedom to terminate your Adsense account. They can terminate it just for the ‘risk’ of generating invalid activity (maybe because your traffic is a little suspicious or you don’t have a privacy policy).
In addition to your tips, I think that new webmasters should not rush into adsense monetization, esp. when their site doesn’t have enough traffic to make much money anyway. If you told your circle of friends about your site they could very well be the majority of your recurring visitors when it’s young. Who knows what impression this could create with Google’s bots? If you get banned when your site has few visitors, you’ll still be banned when your site has thousands of hits a day and could be making real money.
Also, there could be another post: The ugly truth being banned from adense revealed about your business. I love how accessible Adsense can be but we really shouldn’t rest on our laurels based on Adsense income. If Google is providing most of a site’s search traffic and all of its income, that’s a little scary.
Absolutely!! Couldn’t have said it better. Some great tips here!
Google really are very particular over who uses adsense and they don’t want anyone messing with it. The worst thing you can do is click on your own ads, I know someone who clicked on one ad, and nearly got banned!
Very true! Even though Google warns you multiple times on the application NOT TO CLICK YOUR OWN ADS UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES I also hear about people clicking their own ads “just to test.” There is nothing to test, people. It works. LEAVE YOUR ADS ALONE. lol
I clicked on my ad and got banned almost immediately.I hv been reapplying n hvnt been accepted yet.any suggestions pls?
very nice information.this will help us to improve our adsense earning you can also improve your adsense earning by this adsense revenue sharing forum.
debateinn.com
Like you said, it’s in Google’s best interest that we carry Adsense properly on our blogs. I haven’t yet worked out how to get traffic and I’m still always tempted by traffic generation sites. I haven’t gone for one yet, but I admit I’m at a place now where I think I have to do something drastically different from what I’ve been doing these past 5 years. 30 cents is depressing earnings for 9 hours of work.
Great article.
Hang in there, Anne. Have you ever tried guest posting on related blogs? Do you do any networking in social media? Done any YouTube vids?
Hey Anne from the link to your article here I saw your blog and I can understand why you are not getting the fruit of your results. See the first thing that you need to do is learn more about SEO.
For example if I were a google bot the first thing that I find crawling your site are a header Text Link Ad Followed by a small rectangle ad. Also you have no keywords or meta description for your blog.
Have you ever tried using wordpress. You Have lots of Links in your navigation area and the whole site looks cluttered. Lots of things need to improve in order for your site to rank better with the search engines. But your facebook and other social media links need to be enhanced more. So if you are really depressed then there are two ways.
1. Start reading all the tutorials in Lisa’s website ALL OF THEM.
or tell me when you are free and I can teach you some of the techniques that I learnt here and make you understand more in Skype. Cause I really feel sad when people feel depressed with their websites that they worked on so hard. I would be happy to help 🙂
You’re very kind, Rahul. I do have wordpress sites, but have the same problem. I suppose they’re new, so I have to give them time.
I would very much like to take you up on your offer. I don’t have skype, so will have to join up. It’s evening here, so I will let you know (tomorrow) once I’ve joined up and let you know my details.
I’ve read a ton of stuff on all sorts of websites – all sorts.
Thanks again. I really do appreciate your offer.
Anne
Rahul, thumbs up for your generosity!
@Anne sure just hit me up anytime skype name: funfusion999.
@Lisa thnx Lisa. Always up for help 🙂
adsense scam? i dont believe
hi lisa may you help me to make adsense more visible?.thank before
Lisa,
I think you nailed it in your opening, the fact that Google has helpful information. Your reference links are thoughtful and handy,thanks!
I think a side effect of the paranoia about getting banned is the line of thinking that Google is the last place to look for help on the matter, like it’s taboo or something.
cheers!
Hi Lisa,
I was getting a bit curios,i have 2 sources of revenue on adsense,blogger.com and youtube,i am getting ad clicks on blogger but im not earning from it, what does this mean?
probably that you have the adsense code installed incorrectly. if ads are showing, your site is getting traffic and the ads are definitely getting clicked but you are not getting credited for the clicks then you should probably check the Adsense Publisher ID you are using on your Blogger site, sounds like someone else is getting the credit.
Hi Lisa,
This is wicked interesting and important to know. I tried experimenting Adsense on my main site and have been monitoring the activity – so this is just good old secure knowledge to know. On my niche sites, this will also have to be monetized closely since most of the income stream is from Adsense.
Hey Lisa thanks a Lot
@Henry You know the primary reason users get rejected is because they rush too much. Just develop your website without a subdomain. Keep building content and then apply. Cause Anyways you won’t earn if you do not have traffic. And trust me man, getting accepted and then seeing $0.01 is much worse. I hope u get what I am trying to say here 🙂
@Rahul yes, thanks bro you just gave me hope
you are welcome
Thanks for the tips. yes, now I get it all. Lisa thanks one more time because, I’ve never been accepted in to Google adsence each time I try to apply they give me useless reasons why they can’t accept me. so I’ve been among people that usually say Google is scam. But now I guess I now understand something about the so called adsence. My site is only 4months. thanks one more time. I wish to be a successful blogger like you.
Ok what about my content going viral and suddenly there is an increased growth of visitors. I heard that Google says that they will ban if they see that the growth rate of a website is not natural. Then how do they handle viral content.
I think some of this information about AdSense gets taken out of context and makes people paranoid. I wouldn’t worry about that. If your content becomes legitimately viral, typically it will become viral from multiple sources…. Twitter, various websites, Facebook and places Google can track and verify. However if they see an instant stream of traffic from one suspicious IP address or one spammy site and no other valid sources… that’s a different story.
I certainly wouldn’t worry about your popularity getting you banned if you are promoting your site in a legitimate manner. If you use Analytics, Google can instantly tell where your traffic is coming from. If it’s legit, you have nothing to worry about.
A great strategy to avoid click fraud due to sabotage is to remove ads from your site and restore them a few days later. I think that sabotage is made through bots so if they don’t find ads to click, then they quit…
I’m not one those who said “AdSense is a Scam!”
i know that i’m not satisfied…yet, with my revenue with adsense
but i have plans to do in the next years to rise my incomes.
what are your plans? What do you think are the best ways to increase adsense income? Are you going to concentrate on increasing traffic or do you think it’s better to try to increase click through rates, either by filtering ads to be more targetted to page content or through ad placement? Obviously it’s good to do both, but which is more important do you think?
Informative post,I had a bad experience with Adsense early(Got banned without reason) but now i apply for new one and working just fine.. 🙂
This is a good compilation Lisa. I too get several such questions, as Adsense is one of my top revenue sources online from multiple niche websites.
Buying traffic, though might sound enticing to a novice, is a worthless initiative in most experienced folks’ opinion. I would highly recommend straying away from these gimicks.
Brad also made a good point that made me chuckle. Never tell anyone! Or they will click happy their way into banning you from the program! LOL
Well i got the treasure of knowledge related to my topics in single site, Adsense it has banned me 2 times, but it also pays if we work genuinely. When i was beginner i was not aware of its terms, when i read the terms and condition and it policy i followed it. Now i’m earning smoothly through Adsense.
Hi Lisa, it never ceases to amaze me what people will do to get traffic to their sites. Paying for traffic just sounds like a scam as far as I’m concerned. I get emails from time to time from people promising to send traffic to my blog and the first thing that comes to mind is that there is someone else out there who will take them up on the offer. Of course the second thing that comes to mind is to hit the spam button. 🙂
Thanks for providing the details about the appeal process, I’ll be sure to link back to this post in the future.
Thanks, Ileane. Those services really anger me. They prey on people who are desperate for traffic and are the reason many people have lost their AdSense accounts.
Great collection of resources! Am always so paranoid about this happening to myself!
A great tip to add of course is to not ask your visitors to click on your ads and DEFINITELY don’t mention adsense to friends and family who are inexperienced in blogging who will try to help you out by clicking on your ads several times a day.
Absolutely, Brad. A friend of mine did that and she got banned the next day.
This is quite a common sense thing, if we clearly read adsense terms but mistakes do happen. When I started with blogging about 2-3 years ago, I explained everything to my friends about making money online with adsense and got banned after a day. I later came to know that they clicked on ads.
CAN YOU GIVE SOME MORE TIPS TO MAKE MORE MONEY THROUGH THE ADSENSE ? FOR WEB MATRIAL AND GET TRAFFIC ON WEBSITE…THANKS..
Hi Lisa,
great info.
I have found this software adsensedefender(dot)com. can you please please review this product for us. I don’t know much about coding website etc. Can you see if this adsensedefender software is safe to use? I’m thinking if they can some how steal our adsense revenue or some how can hack into our site if I upload this software to my site and blog.
thank you
I tried installing it and had to return it because I got errors.
LOL about not telling people about your adsense…It is true, because I almost got banned from google once.
Anyway, I think it’s best to keep your secret for yourself.
Great article, thanks
Regards,
Dev