I’ve Been Banned: Google Adsense Doesn’t Want Cheerfulnuts Anymore
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If you’re one of the frequent visitors of my site, first of all, I want to say thank you. If you love looking at my avatar, you may notice that my Hubscore is getting lower each day. You may wonder why. Does it mean I write low quality hubs? Does it mean I haven’t logged into my HubPages account for a long time? Did I pick a fight with a HubPages staff? Or did I harass an innocent and kind Hubber? The answer to all these questions, my friend, is NO. I did not do any of these things. I used to have a Hubscore ranging from 89 to 92. I did not desert my HubPages account. In fact, I check my account every single day. My traffic has been increasing, along with my followers. I’ve been kind to everyone. I was happy, and hoping that my earnings would double in the coming months. But, all my dreams have been shattered after receiving a Dear John from Google.
Dear John: Google Deserted Cheerfulnuts
On September 10, 2011, I was checking my earnings on HubPages when I realized that my Google Adsense Account had been disabled. It was stated that I had violated Adsense’s TOS. As a result, my HubPages Ad Program had been deactivated. Thinking that it was a site glitch, I logged into my email to check if I had received any email regarding this. There it was, the dreaded email from Google.
Hello,
After reviewing our records, we've determined that your AdSense account poses a risk of generating invalid activity. Because we have a responsibility to protect our AdWords advertisers from inflated costs due to invalid activity, we've found it necessary to disable your AdSense account. Your outstanding balance and Google's share of the revenue will both be fully refunded back to the affected advertisers.
Please understand that we need to take such steps to maintain the effectiveness of Google's advertising system, particularly the advertiser-publisher relationship. We understand the inconvenience that this may cause you, and we thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.
If you have any questions or concerns about the actions we've taken, how you can appeal this decision, or invalid activity in general, you can find more information by visiting
http://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=57153.
Sincerely,
The Google AdSense Team
My New Google Adsense Homepage
I was stunned. Without my Adsense, I can no longer earn with HubPages Ad Program. What did I do? Being banned from Google Adsense had never crossed my mind. I had never expected this since I had never clicked on my ads nor had asked anyone to click them. Besides, I hardly get any clicks on my sites! The most clicks I got were from WebAnswers (a site where you earn through asking and/or answering questions). I don’t remember getting suspiciously large number of clicks from a single site or page in a day. I couldn’t confirm this though since I can no longer access my Google Adsense account. This is how my Google Adsense hompage looks like now:
Account Disabled
Your AdSense account for this login is currently disabled. We recommend checking your email inboxes for any messages we may have sent you regarding your account status. Sometimes our messages can be caught by email filters, so please be sure to check the Bulk/Spam folders of your email accounts as well.
If your account was disabled for invalid click activity, please visit our Disabled Account FAQ for more information.
Return to AdSense home.
I quickly clicked the link to “Disabled Account FAQ” to find out which Google policy I had violated. I reread the article a few times, but I’m not guilty of any of those violations stated!
One More Chance
Google gives a chance to banned individuals by letting them fill out an appeal form (provided by Google) to reinstate their account. However, I have read in forums that once you’ve been banned, you’ll only have a slim chance of getting back your account. I’ve also learned that some innocent people had never been reinstated. I recommend you to take a look at the appeal form. In case Google bans you, you will know what sort of information is needed. It is ideal if you have an account in Google Analytics. If you don’t have one yet, sign up now. It will help you figure out where your traffic is coming from, where you’re getting most of your Adsense clicks, and how often a certain visitor views your site. If you notice anything weird (e.g. lots of traffic from suspicious-looking sites, lots of clicks on a certain page), contact Google before they ban you.
After I have pulled myself together, I started filling out the form as best as I could. I didn’t hurry. Even if I can no longer access my Google Adsense page, I can still view my Google Analytics. I noticed that I’ve been getting lots of traffic from certain websites that I’ve never visited. I Googled my pen name “cheerfulnuts” and found some dubious sites containing my links as well.
I have asked my sister seriousnuts to proofread my answers. I have also checked my grammar and spelling. I tried to sound professional and polite despite my dismay. After many times of examining my work, I finally pushed the “submit” button. I’ve done my job. I hope Google will do theirs.
I’m Sorry
If you’ve just been banned and hoping to get some valuable information here, then I apologize for not being so helpful. I still got no news from Google. I do hope that someday, I will receive a letter from Google telling me that they’re reinstating my account. If that day comes, I will let you know. For now, all I can do is to wait for Google to want cheerfulnuts again.
Update (November 3, 2011)
Good News and Bad News
I’m going to tell you guys about the bad news first. After more than a month of waiting, I’ve finally received a reply from Google. They had rejected my appeal. My sister seriousnuts got the same letter a few weeks ahead so I wasn’t expecting to be reinstated. Even if the Google ban had haunted me for quite some time, I felt a sigh of relief after receiving their email. I got my closure now. It’s over and I can finally move on.
The good news is, I’ve also received a reply from HubPages (I’ve emailed them asking what will happen to my balance on HP). This is an excerpt from their succinct email:
As for the balance sitting in your account, we pay the following month for any balance over $5.00. For example, if you were banned on 10/15, your balance will be paid out on 12/20.
I’m confused about the dates. Anyway, I can still get my earnings from HP? That’s terrific! I thought I’ve lost everything. I remember having more than $5 balance on HP. It’s only a small amount compared to what I had on Google Adsense account, but I’m not complaining. It’s great to know that my time spent here on HubPages didn’t go in vain.:)
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I am so sorry to hear about this. All the best with your appeal; they have been some successful appeals despite what everyone says. Good luck!
I am so sorry you've been banned from Google. I was almost banned once due to copy & pasted material on Webanswers. My material was not copied, but my Adsense code was placed on a page with copy & pasted material that I had nothing to do with. I had to fill out paperwork for Google, too. It is so scary and I hope they give your account back to you. Keep us posted!
Gosh cheerfulnuts, I am sorry to read this. I do not understand why you would be banned either. I did read something about Google cracking down on certain countries because of the amount of people breaking their terms of services but I did not think that they would terminate accounts of people who were not guilty of it. I hope your account really gets reinstated. I never used Google analytics before because I don't get much clicks to begin with either but now I think I will.
I feel your pain, but since I am not making any money whatsoever, (unless 47 cents counts) from my HugPages, being banned from Google Adsense, probably wouldn't cause me to panic. Just read an article recently that HubPages is worth $10,000,000. Not a bad profit margin considering most of their writers are making zero. Good luck with Google!
Aww, I'm sorry, Cheerfulnuts. That's terrible. I hope Google reinstates your account. :(
@Harry: Yes, it is a scary story. I wish it will have a happy ending though.
@IzzyM: Thank you so much. I've read about it too and hope that I will be one of those lucky people.
@Jeannie: That was scary. I'm glad you didn't get banned. How did you prove to Google that you had nothing to do with it? Thanks for telling me about this. I've already told my sister to be extra careful. She is very active on WebAnswers. I will keep everyone posted.
Btw, your avatar had changed her outfit. LOL
What I had to do was contact the admins at WebAnswers to get them to remove the copy & pasted answer. They did remove it within 24 hours. I then had to sign a written statement with Google promising the answer had been removed. It was a really scary time.
It is not fair that your Adsense account can be shutdown if you had nothing to do with someone clicking on your ads. I always worry that something like that can happen to anyone. I hope they reinstate your account.
Yes, my avatar wanted to celebrate Halloween. Hehe.
@North Wind: Thank you. I've also read about it somewhere, but some people said that it wasn't true. I don't really know which is true, anyway, all we can do is to be extra careful with whatever we're doing on the internet. Yes, you should try Google Analytics. I don't understand every bit of information it provides, but I think it's very helpful.
@Prisana: Thank you for your sympathy. I hate to burst your bubble, but as I've mentioned, without your Google Adsense account, you wouldn't be able to earn with HubPages Ad Program.:( I used to think that Google Adsense has nothing to do with HubPages Ad Program. I really hope that that's the case, so I would still be able to earn even without my Google Adsense account.:(
@JEDIJESSICUH: Thank you for your kindness and sympathy. I hope my account will be reinstated, too. I guess we Hubbers (or webmasters) should learn how to protect ourselves.
@Jeannie: What scares me is that we are always at risk for getting banned since our Adsense ID appears on any page (of WebAnswers) and we have no control over it. I think WebAnswers should try to protect its members more. Besides, having copy & pasted materials on its site will jeopardize WA's own Adsense account.
cheerfulnuts, I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you! I hate this happened.. I keep hearing about this happening to people and it's just NOT right. You are a great writer with a lot of potential with or without AdSense. Keep your chin up!
@Jamie: Thanks so much for your kind words. I'm really hoping to get the good news in the coming weeks. Your hubs made me feel hopeful. It's been more than a week now. I keep on thinking what I did wrong. During the past few days after getting banned, I was trying to correct the things in my sites that might have violated Google's TOS. It's driving me crazy. I wanted to write down (in this hub) all my suspicion why I was banned, but I don't want to scare people, since I don't have a basis, so I just kept it to myself. I wish Google had stated "my" violation more clearly...
Thanks for this article.
I'm wondering if anyone else is having this problem. I just received a similar notice to yours today (a few days before they are due to pay me, incidentally - they owe me over $100). What I can't figure out is I only have items posted at hubpages, triond.com and bukisa.
Of course, no explanation was given and they said they planned to steal the money from me and give it to their advertisers. While I'm pretty sure they're robbing me, I don't believe for an instant that they're granting money back to advertisers who have in no way been harmed by me!
Is it possible they have changed something in their terms of service and failed then failed to advise us of it - and now they are retroactively disabling certain accounts?
What ever they are up to, it's no good. This is the kind of criminal behavior I would expect from a credit card company!
@Serena: After all this, it's hard not to hate Google. When people start making money, Google would suddenly lock their accounts without any apparent reason. This is something I do not understand. It's quite traumatic. I was even excited to see how much I'll earn in December (I heard that publishers earn more during holidays). It's disappointing. But what else can we do? This is the giant Google. I really hope this is just a mistake, but for now, we have to look for other opportunities, too. Good luck to you, and please keep us posted. Thank you for dropping by and for your comment.
I don't believe it was a mistake... it was pre-meditated theft. As you said, they have a reputation for doing this to people to have an excuse not to pay them.
The only thing to do is to move content to places where you can earn from a variety of different affiliate programs who (I hope) aren't criminals.
Yes you are right. We have to move our content to other places. It was my mistake to rely solely on Google Adsense. I hadn't thought about this before I was banned. My goal now is to look for several different programs and writing platforms. Good luck to you. I hope better things will happen despite all this.
Cheerfulnuts,
I'm not sure about this, because no one is. But, a lot of Triond writers have had their Adsense inexplicably disabled since July. Triond was having a problem with allowing porn to be posted to some of their pages. They've tried to clean it up.
It appears that THEY still have their Adsense account, though, because they are still revenue sharing through Adsense with their remaining writers.
No one is sure that's what is happening, though. No one has received an explanation from them for their disgusting, criminal behavior. And, I've never heard of anyone except Jamie having their account re-instated. I'm sure this admission of guilt on their part would mean they would have to pay you what they owe you. Plus, there are your lost revenues.
My sister had told me not to sign up on Triond although I forgot the reason why. She'd read that people don't recommend the site. Thanks for the info Serena.
I would accept it if Google had given me a clear explanation. But since their email is vague, I feel cheated. We all feel cheated.:(
I've been at Triond for probably 3 years. It's the first place I ever made significant revenues. But, Triond has a bad reputation, too. They are not forthright about the number of unique clicks your content receives.
They seem to do a similar little tricks as Google to keep you from earning significant money. If you start earning a lot one month, they appear to cap your earnings.
A lot of writers have seen a significant drop in their earnings there since a few months ago. It's not worth it, anymore. I'll be leaving them, too - and I have a few hundred articles there. The company is in Tel Aviv, Israel. Like Google, if you have a problem, there's no way to e-mail them. You can go to the forum and it literally takes 4 to 6 months to get a nonsensical reply from them...
Good riddance to them, too!
Opps - I guess I should have read this first. My previous comment said you should be ok with the Hubpages ad program but I guess the work together. I am sorry for your lose and I hope Google is able to set things right for you!
@Serena: It's hard to trust anyone on the internet. Since Google is a big company, I thought I could trust them. But I guess being big doesn't mean they're trustworthy.
I hope we will be able to find better ways to earn money online. Now that I've realized how much I enjoy writing, I don't want to give it up.
I wish you the very best of luck.
@barbergirl28: I hope that I will be reinstated, though I highly doubt it now. There are a lot of publishers (with good reputations) who had been banned and never got their accounts back. I just wish Google will tell us what we did wrong.
I've already wasted so much time moping over this. I want to focus now on finding other ways to earn online. Thanks so much for you comment. I really appreciate it.:)
Cheerfulnuts, Google is a cheater, a big cheater, (I am jacksparrow from WebAnswers). I feel like bombarding Google office for banning our accounts. I'd just force you :) to not to use Google products in any way and tell as many friends of yours as you can the way Google earns money and don't make them earn, we have to spread this message all around the world and stop Google from making any money, let them earn from impressions that'd be a few cents and every advertiser pay for impressions, they won't even manage to pay the their security guard a salary for keeping their office clean with that much money and they will go bankrupt.
Shailesh549/jacksparrow, I don't know what to say. I had checked your profile page on WebAnswers just a few days ago and saw you were still being active on that site. I thought you were safe from Google's autumn cleaning. I'm sorry about what happened to you. I'm really saddened by this news and had told my sister about this right away. After all this, I hate Google. But I don't have the strength to fight them. Google's reputation is already bad. But publishers still use Adsense. People do benefit from Google. It just happened that we were a bunch of unlucky people whom Google had chosen to exploit. I doubt if people will listen to us. Sometimes, I feel that apart from those who had been banned, no one would believe that we are innocent. They wouldn't understand. Anyway, if Google continues to cheat people, they would eventually go bankrupt. I think for now, this article is enough. I will focus on searching other ways to earn money. I've been sad for several days after getting banned. I don't want to think about Google anymore. They don't deserve my attention.
This is really shocking. I've been there. And I understand how disappointing it is. I don't know what to expect now. But I sincerely wish that something good will happen to all of us who had been banned. Best wishes.
This is quite depressing. I know how awful it makes me feel when one of my yahoo answers or one of my hubs gets banned and yet this is so much worse because its the way we all earn our money. All the work and writing for nothing. However i am really pleased you have let us know as its good to be forewarned. They need to let you know why you have been banned, otherwise, they are not really keeping to the agreement I'm sure. Ive heard this story before. Its like as soon as you start to earn money they ban you.
Hi Lesleysherwood. It was indeed depressing. Sometimes, I can't help feeling jealous of others who are enjoying their Adsense earnings. But there are some other ways to earn apart from Adsense. I'm still hopeful with my blog. I'm using other ad networks now such as Infolinks and Chitika. It's just annoying that I can no longer here on HubPages. My only hope here is Amazon - but I haven't been successful with it yet.
If this hub could help other publishers from getting banned, I would really be happy. Thanks so much for dropping by and for your comment.:)
cheerfulnuts Your article is informative. I have taken note of that and will do the needful. Thanks
Thank you makusr!:) I'm glad to know that.
What I am noticing though Cheerfulnuts is that the ad-sense seems to still be using your hubs for their adverts? mmmmmm
Hi Lesley. Yes Google ads still appear on my hubs. They are HP's, not mine.:( So if anyone clicks on them, HP earns. I'm still thinking of asking HP to remove all the Google ads from my page. I haven't received any reply from Google yet after my appeal. It's been more than a month now.
Its just I was thinking of deactivating my Google ad-sense account to enable my hubs to have more ad-programs (that balance always increases) and then I thought about you and how the ads are still showing.
Really? Is it possible to deactivate your Adsense account? Because I though HP ad program requires Google Adsense. If this is possible, let us know. I was thinking about asking HP if I can still activate my HP ad program despite being banned by Google. I didn't ask them anymore after reading somewhere that Adsense is required in HP ad program.
I'm not sure. But I do know someone that has ad-programs on her website without having an account with ad-sense. I was surprised that your ad-programs was deactivated. Why don't you email hub pages and ask them? They're very good at getting back to you.
Okay, I will email HP about this. I will keep you posted. Thanks Lesley.:)
Good one. You can email me direct if you like, I'm interested to know the outcome as I will drop ad-sense if possible. Only if they allow more Ad Programs on my hubs though. No point if the page is the same, except the satisfaction of banning them first. I get the feeling that as soon as we earn money with them, we get banned.
Start your own site, there are a number of adsense alternatives that you can use (just do a search for them) and use these on your new sites rather than google..
But I am a little worried about the statement in their letter that says - "we've determined that your AdSense account poses a risk of generating invalid activity", not that you have done something wrong but that you might do something wrong!!! If it truly is with regard to the country you are from then it really is scary..
Have just started a new thread in the forums as I just noticed you have a click here type picture above the voting buttons - but this is now an add block - so you have a picture pointing at adds saying click here!!!!!
Even if it does say green button i think there is an opportunity for some pedant at Google to decide it is against their TOS
LeanMan, thank you so much for coming here to check my hubs. That is what I'm trying to do now. I had been busy searching for other ad networks during these past few weeks. I have started blogging around the same time I've signed up here. Though my blog is already 7 months old, I'm not satisfied with my traffic. It doesn't compare to HubPages.
Last month, a lot of publishers have also been banned by Google. They have received the exact same letter. I kept on thinking what I have done wrong, but after I've heard from others about their being banned, I can't help but think they've banned us because of our country.
I've just replied to you in the forum, but for the sake of other readers, I'm going to repeat what I've said. I'm sure it wasn't the picture. The ad space has appeared only several days after I was banned. Thanks for telling me this anyway. It might be helpful to other readers. I don't know if I should remove it, since I am planning to ask HP to take all Google ads off my hubs.
There are Google ads on your page now. Are you re-instated by Google now?
Hi Astra. Nope, I haven't been reinstated. The ads still appear, but all the earnings would go to HubPages. Thanks for your concern.:)
Same thing just happened to us (www.ViviLeDish.com)! WE DID NOTHING WRONG! The only thing I can think of is that we are a group of moms who actually use the site we created for kids WITH OUR KIDS! I clicked on ads as a consumer sometimes because something looked good and I was curious if I should buy it for my kids. It was not invalid activity. I'm so upset and offended!
Hi MamaGLeDish. I'm sorry about your site getting banned. I think Adsense should give us a warning first before disabling our accounts. I've read somewhere that a publisher had violated one of Google's TOS, but instead of banning her, Google emailed her and asked her to do some changes on her website. I just find it unfair that others are given second chances while we don't. Google should treat us all equally.
Some ad networks, such as Nuffnang, allow publishers to click their own ads if they find it interesting. Google, on the other hand, doesn't allow us to click our own ads no matter what. Some publishers would even contact Adsense if they've accidentally clicked their own ads.
If you haven't sent your appeal, please do so and let me know what happens. Good luck and I hope you'll get your account back!
Harry Santos Level 1 Commenter 8 months ago
That's such as a scary story! I wish you are able to get this fixed! Now I'm so scared to get banned even when I'm not doing anything!