SEARCHENGINES
Google Ads Account Suspensions Complaints
Last week we reported that Google Ads campaigns were seeing mass disapproval and suspensions but now I am seeing new reports of Google Ad account suspensions across multiple verticals. I am unsure if this is a new thing or just something Google Ads advertisers need to deal with more often, but it seems like something triggered this week. I see mass complaints about account suspensions in the Google Ads support forums.
Google Ads and chart expert Greg Finn, who I trust fully, posted on Twitter yesterday, “Hearing about suspended Google Ads accounts across varying verticals. Anyone else seeing this?” Others did indeed reply but no one from Google replied yet, which is a bit upsetting.
And there are tons, tons of complaints about this in the official Google Ads Forums – way too many to link to, just go there and do a control – F for “suspen…” Here are just some of the ones I spotted in the last few hours, there are so many more:
Here are some of the replies from those in the Google Ads PPC community:
Not only accounts, also MCCs get suspended for circumventing systems 🤷🏻♂️
— Vincent Beima | The Google Ads Consultant (@vincentbeima) February 21, 2023
@gregfinn Dozens of advertisers reach out to us every week for help resolving Google Ads suspensions. I haven’t seen a particular increase recently, but I’ll update this if that changes.
Most common reasons:
Circumventing
Suspicious Payments
Misrepresentation (GMC)— John Horn (@JohnHornSG) February 21, 2023
I had one of these earlier this year. Support was no help and I finally figured out the zip code was entered wrong and we fixed that. Any chance something in the payment information is off?
— Harrison Jack Hepp (@HarrisonJHepp) February 21, 2023
Got one today for an account that sells mini dumper … yup!
— MJ🍩 (@mjharpon) February 21, 2023
Last year alone had over 40 accounts. All but 1 were suspicious payments
Manual review cleared them all but took over 7-8 weeks
— Josiah Daves (@josiah_daves) February 21, 2023
Yes! I manage a lot of accounts for carpet cleaners, and 7pm last night we had a Local Services Ads account suspended for circumventing systems. No warning
— ♛ Reuben D. Rock ♛ (@reubenrock) February 21, 2023
Mine got suspended today for circumventing systems. Thought that was funny considering i havent added a payment method or even launched any campaigns.
— Mathias (@mathiasx1010) February 21, 2023
Happed to me today. Cannot get threw to support, chat just leaves me with a link to the help page.
— McAfee (@McAfeeCz) February 21, 2023
Had 7 accounts get suspended. All of the were because we hadn’t setup and verified the payment. Just got one back online after 36 hours. Working next now
— Eric Vevang (@VevangEric) February 22, 2023
2 MCC accounts that I manage got suspended due to circumventing systems policy and 1 of them is not even set up (no child account or payment method). Support hasn’t been of any help. They just ask to wait for 3-5 days and never get back.
— Hitesh Mehta (@iamhiteshmehta) February 22, 2023
I do hope someone from Google replies today…
Forum discussion at threads above and Twitter.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Won’t Change The 301 Signals For Ranking & SEO
Gary Illyes from Google said on stage at the SERP conference last week that there is no way that Google would change how the 301 redirect signal works for SEO or search rankings. Gary added that it’s a very reliable signal.
Nikola Minkov quoted Gary Illyes as saying, “It is a very reliable signal, and there is no way we could change that signal,” when asked if a 301 redirect not working is a myth. Honestly, I am not sure the context of this question, as it is not clear from the post on X, but here it is:
More from @methode:
– 301 redirect not working is a myth. “It is a very reliable signal, and there is no way we could change that signal”.#SERPConf2024#SERPConf2024International— Nikola Minkov (@n_minkov) April 19, 2024
We’ve covered 301 redirects here countless times – but I never saw a myth that Google does not use 301 redirects as a signal for canonicalization or for passing signals from an old URL to the redirected URL.
Forum discussion at X.
Note: This was pre-written and scheduled to be posted today, I am currently offline for Passover.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Again Says Ignore Link Spam Especially To 404 Pages
I am not sure how many times Google has said that you do not need to disavow spammy links, that you can ignore link spam attacks and that links pointing to pages that 404/410 are links that do not count – but John Mueller from Google said it again.
In a thread on X, John Mueller from Google wrote, “if the links are going to URLs that 404 on your site, they’re already dropped.” “They do nothing,” he added, “If there’s no indexable destination URL, there’s no link.”
John then added, “I’d generally ignore link-spam, and definitely ignore link-spam to 404s.”
Asking if it would hurt to disavow, after responding with the messages above, John wrote:
It will do absolutely nothing. I would take the time to rework a holistic & forward-looking strategy for the site overall instead of working on incremental tweaks (other tweaks might do something, but you probably need real change, not tweaks).
Earlier this year we had tons of SEOs notice spammy links to 404 error pages, John said ignore them. In 2021, Google said links to 404 pages do not count, Google also said that in 2012 and many other times.
Plus, outside of links to 404 pages, Google has said to ignore spammy links, time and time again – even the toxic links – ignore them. The messaging around this changed in 2016 when Penguin 4.0 was released and Google began devaluing links over demoting them.
Here are those new posts in context:
I’d say add both. Lol
— Jeremy Rivera (@JeremyRiveraSEO) April 11, 2024
Sure. But also, save yourself the work completely :-).
— John 🧀 … 🧀 (@JohnMu) April 11, 2024
Re-reading your initial post – if the links are going to URLs that 404 on your site, they’re already dropped. They do nothing. If there’s no indexable destination URL, there’s no link. I’d generally ignore link-spam, and definitely ignore link-spam to 404s.
— John 🧀 … 🧀 (@JohnMu) April 11, 2024
… but still… is this a dumb idea?
— Rebekah Edwards (@rebekah_creates) April 11, 2024
It will do absolutely nothing. I would take the time to rework a holistic & forward-looking strategy for the site overall instead of working on incremental tweaks (other tweaks might do something, but you probably need real change, not tweaks).
— John 🧀 … 🧀 (@JohnMu) April 11, 2024
And in general, Google says it ignores spammy links, so you should too (not new) but this post from John Mueller is:
I would just ignore them, Google ignores them too. Sometimes they’re just more visible in tools, but that doesn’t mean they’re a problem.
— John 🧀 … 🧀 (@JohnMu) April 18, 2024
And then also on Mastodon wrote about a similar situation, “Google has 2 decades of practice of ignoring spammy links. There’s no need to do anything for those links.”
Forum discussion at X.
Note: This was pre-written and scheduled to be posted today, I am currently offline for Passover.
SEARCHENGINES
Google Needs Very Few Links To Rank Pages; Links Are Less Important
Gary Illyes from Google spoke at the SERP Conf on Friday and he said what he said numerous times before, that Google values links a lot less today than it did in the past. He added that Google Search “needs very few links to rank pages.”
Gary reportedly said, “We need very few links to rank pages… Over the years we’ve made links less important.”
I am quoting Patrick Stox who is quoting what he heard Gary say on stage at the event. Here is Patrick’s post where Gary did a rare reply:
I shouldn’t have said that… I definitely shouldn’t have said that
— Gary 鯨理/경리 Illyes (so official, trust me) (@methode) April 19, 2024
Gary said this a year ago, also in 2022 and other times as well. We previously covered that Google said links would likely become even less important in the future. And even Matt Cutts, the former Googler, said something similar about eight years ago and the truth is, links are weighted a lot less than it was eight years ago and that trend continues. A couple of years ago, Google said links are not the most important Google search ranking factor.
Of course, many SEOs think Google lies about this.
Judith Lewis interviewed Gary Illyes at the SERP Conf this past Friday.
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