Adwords account suspended for talking about SEO. Why isn't Moz suspended, too?
-
First let me say that we don't care that much about Adwords. We were spending about 20 bucks a month and we never optimized it, tinkered with it, or cared that much. Business is booming for us just with organic search and referrals from happy customers. (We're a blog writing service called BlogMutt. Motto: We work like a dog to fill up your blog.)
But we just got suspended from Adwords. After multiple inquiries and multiple unhelpful responses, we got a note that said: "Please note that your website contains matter which states your site's SEO increases. Anything which relates to SEO is not allowed as per Google Policies. Please make appropriate changes to your website."
Now, we don't say your site's SEO increases with BlogMutt. What we do say is what everyone says, that blogging is a best practice for any modern marketing effort. We certainly are less clear about improving search rankings than, for example, moz.com. Why is it OK for Moz, but not for us?
Don't get me wrong. I think Moz should be able to continue advertising. I'm just wondering how we got into the Adwords crosshairs.
Any thoughts?
-
I wonder if that's it.
I forgot about that text, wrote it like two years ago. I'll scour through the site, see if I find any others like that.
I still wonder how this got on Google's radar. I just did a search for the offending phrase there "SEO improves" and I see a bunch of advertisers who are violating this rule on their home pages AND in the ad itself.
That is, how is it that I'm in trouble for two words on an inside page and another guy can advertise: "Guaranteed Page One SEO" and get the second ad spot?
-
I do see on this page https://www.blogmutt.com/pages/customer there is a How It Works with the following:
- We write a blog post on the suggested topic using the ideal number of keywords.
- You post the content to your blog.
- Your site's SEO improves.
- Through your blog, you will engage new customers.
Could it be that they feel this is a guarantee that you can't back? I'm not saying anything against you or your company here, but just trying to see where Google might find an issue with things. One of the conditions in Advertiser Claims is "All advertising claims must be factually supportable." https://support.google.com/adwordspolicy/answer/1331529?hl=en&ref_topic=1310871
-
See images below. And thanks in advance for any insights.
-
OK, here are two images. One is just the notice that's at the top of my adwords screen when I'm logged in. The second is the note I got from Google after I requested an appeal.
It's really mysterious. The part about SEO is the most specific they've gotten with us, and it still doesn't really make sense.
Any ideas are most welcome! I don't belong to any PPC forums because it's such a small part of our overall efforts, so I'd much rather get an answer here.
6a00d8357e4fe369e201a73dd2f8b1970d-pi 6a00d8357e4fe369e201a73dd2f8ac970d-pi
-
OK, since you are the second person to ask, I will get some screen shots and post them here.
I guess that's kind of my question, but it's more like, "Why is it that we got singled out for doing something that lots of great and reputable companies -- such as Moz -- do every day?"
And thanks for looking at our site. I think the only place we mention SEO is in the video, so maybe that's what we need to change, but we make a claim that is much much milder than any of the SEO software providers or consultants.
-
I know! Something doesn't add up!
Yes, I'm 100 percent sure it's legit stuff from Google.
I think they reply to all requests for appeal, no matter the amount. I do think Google does not consider dollar amounts when deciding to suspend, and just goes off the rules.
And I understand that they don't want people gaming the system so they can't give advice that's too specific.
But I still just don't understand what's going on here.
-
I think a screen shot would be most helpful to understand the issue at hand - including who the email came from and the part that you've bolded "your site's seo increases." To me, this doesn't read as a full sentence. And, when I look at your site, your site doesn't actually say anything about SEO on the home page.
When you log into your account what do you see?
If AdWords traffic doesn't matter, then could you explain what type of resolution you are looking for in this Q&A? Is your question "why can other sites advertise on terms like 'SEO'?"
-
Something doesn't add up here. If you do a search for "SEO" the page is littered with ads for SEO companies. Are you sure that this email was from an Adwords representative? If you're spending $20 a month, I would be surprised if you could get a rep to respond.
-
Hmmm, I still don't know why your account would have gotten flagged simply for "being about SEO" so something is definitely up... I would suggest submitting your story to the big SEO/PPC news sites like searchenginewatch.com, searchengineland.com, searchenginejournal.com, etc. because people need to be aware of this and then maybe you will get a more detailed response from Google.
-
The ads were pretty generic. Our most used was: "Customized, weekly blog posts to help you connect with customers."
The violation was for our landing page, which is the same as our home page: https://www.blogmutt.com. There's nothing there about SEO. The video does say that blogging can help you get found by people searching on Google, but that's way less of a claim than Moz or any of the other content providers.
So, that's why I wonder why we got flagged. We've had to kick out some writers because they were rotten writers, and I wonder if one of them was so mad that he reported our ads to Google and that's why we got suspended. We'll probably never know that, but that's about the only theory I can come up with.
-
What did the ads say? And the landing pages? There are tons of AdWords advertisers that bid on SEO-related keywords, so this is the first time I've ever heard of anything like this.
-
That line is the only useful part of that email. The rest is just account details.
It is directly from Google as a response to our request for an appeal of our suspension.
And we do our own, we don't use an agency or third-party for our adwords.
-
hi Scott,
Is it possible to grab a screenshot of that note? Is it from Google? Or some other SEO agency/advertiser you got that message?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Adwords Broad Match Quality Score
** This question is about QS of Broad Match and how it pertains to THE AUCTION ONLY. Not looking for opinions on campaign/ad group structure/strategies. For an Adwords account where all the ad groups are using modified broad match keywords I see that some keywords are assigned quality score. Obviously a broad match keyword can be triggered by a very wide variety of actual keyword searches. So I assume/guess that Adwords assigns a quality score for every single keyword entered that matches with that broad match and then makes the quality score for the broad match an average of the actual search term used quality score weighted by the volume of searches for that search term? Or am I wrong and the quality score for a broad match is the exact match quality score for that term (I doubt that since broad match the words can be in any order.) So for example, let's same I have this broad match score: +auto +insurance This is going to match with: auto insurance companies, auto insurance prices, luxury auto insurance, auto insurance brokers, and on and on and on. Let's say my landing page happens to have a lot of content about ratings for auto insurance brokers. If the CTR for that terms is high, when it's matching my modified broad match, does that mean Adwords assigns a higher quality score, internally, to the search term "auto insurance broker" so if that term is entered, for the purpose of the auction, Adwords doesn't use the quality score of the broad match but the quality score it has calculated for that specific search term -- I just can't see what it is because I don't have that term as an exact match term on my account. Or, does it use the broad match quality score no matter what search term is used that matched the broad match? I would be highly surprised if that was true. If this were true, then you would want to break out the important terms into their own exact match keywords. In many cases, the more efficient strategy for an account is to have fairly narrow modified broad match terms coupled with a very large negative keyword list. The question is mainly, is there any advantage from the perspective of competing in the auction to have the term be an exact match versus matching a modified broad match keyword? If QS is stored for the actual search term, then I would assume the answer is NO. I know it would provide more granular reporting and the ability to more fine tune landing pages etc etc etc but I'm just talking purely from the perspective of the auction.
Paid Search Marketing | | Searchout0 -
Adwords negative keywords / keyword lists conflicting?
Does any of you had any experience on large 5k+ shared negative keyword lists impacting normal campaign negative keywords in Adwords even if they are not selected on these campaigns? And a second question; does anyone know how selected negative keyword lists can be removed from a campaign? I seem to be able to add them but not to remove them... Cheers!
Paid Search Marketing | | hellemans0 -
What is the SEO value of Thomasnet
Ok, the company I work for has had a paid listing on Thomasnet.com. This was started long before I took over the marketing. We get no real value from Thomasnet, just a lot of solicitation for unrelated things. And my company has been paying $15,000 a year for this listing. Thomasnet is a huge waste of money and I want to cancel it. The problem is that I do not have a good understanding of the link value from Thomasnet. They have a high domain authority and we have a good number of links from them because we pay for the listing. If we stop paying, those links go away and I am afraid it will hurt us in our rankings. Any insights? Thanks!
Paid Search Marketing | | dloeschen0 -
AdWords/Analytics Paid Search conversions not matching up - any idea why?
Hi all, Any ideas as to why AdWords and Analytics are showing different Paid Search conversion numbers for me when I check on a daily basis? Both accounts are linked, they share the same destination URLs to trigger a conversion, some days each reflects the same amount of conversions, then some days it's anything from 1-5 conversions different (Analytics is always the one to show more). Thanks M
Paid Search Marketing | | Martin_S0 -
How much does Google adwords cost increase year to year?
I am trying to find about how much the cost of Pay-Per-Click increases year to year? If anyone can point me to some data/study that speaks to this I would appreciate it very much.
Paid Search Marketing | | JerrodDavid0 -
Why don't national brands have PPC ads that target their names, while smaller brands do?
Google's policy is to allow other businesses to run PPC ads against your business name, even when trademarked, so long as the ads don't include the trademarked name. At least that's what I have experienced and read online. Source: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/AdWords/thread?tid=55e2b4bf90ae9585&hl=en Why do so many national brands have no PPC ads showing on their names in Google searches? http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=best+buy http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=victorias+secret http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=office+depot And so on. Smaller brands, even when trademarked, are awash in competitors targeting their names: http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=nally+used+cars http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=la+jolla+cosmetic+surgery+centre Consider these two hotels: http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=ritz+carlton+new+york http://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hotel+3030+new+york There are two slightly different questions in play here, as I have clients I'd like to better protect against this type of PPC poaching: So, are there any different policies at Google Adwords RE: national brands and having competitor's ads show on their names? How do the major brands block the advertisers on their names? Thanks!
Paid Search Marketing | | CakeWebsites0 -
Do Google Autofill and Instant Search affect Adwords' Keyword Tool reports?
While performing keyword research around the term "windows", I noticed the keyword "windo" gets 18,000 global monthly searches with .23 competition. Why is this? Do y'all think the Google Autofill and Instant Search features affect reports generated by using the Google Adwords keyword tool? For example, if a user starts typing a search query only to find the site they were looking for before they finished typing the search query, does Google count the partial keyword the user never finished typing into the Adwords Keyword report? I've always wondered about this. Sometimes I find it tempting to attack a misspelled keyword because of the massive search volume and low competition for that keyword. I realize that many consumers may not be very good at spelling, and this may reflect a large search volume towards a misspelled keyword. On the other hand, I see this trend of high volume, misspelled keywords many times while performing keyword research for a variety of clients. Thanks.
Paid Search Marketing | | GlobeRunner0 -
Your Google AdWords account has been permanently suspended for repeated violation of AdWords or Landing Page and Site policies in this or a related account.
My client nor I received any warning. We even had a google adwords team optimize the account and my rep does not yet know the reason for the ban. Not sure if its related but their google organic rankings dropped significantly at the same time. https://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=164786 Any advice here? Do these Questions get indexed by google? I will ask my client if I can disclose the domain. Is there any way around a permanent ban? They were spending 50K per month. Is this enough to have any clout?
Paid Search Marketing | | webbroi0