There are a few things that make all of us more nervous than getting a notification like “Your Ad Account Has Been Disabled”. Usually, it happens right after you start having profitable campaigns on your ad account, and you think things are going great.
Some might know what they did wrong to deserve such a punishment, but for a lot of marketers, this comes without warning, and often without good reason. This can be extremely frustrating sometimes, as you get the feeling that the platform has something against your personality.
The problems can only go from bad to worse if you get multiple accounts restricted, as that can lower your overall standing with the platform and even get your entire business manager banned. The only good thing about all of this is that there are ways you can fight against it and end up without losing access to everything. So learn what you can, appeal, and get back to business!
Why Does This Even Happen?
The first thing you need to understand is that you are not directly targeted. Even if it seems like it, it's mostly automated algorithms that make these decisions without human supervision, based on sometimes flawed factors. Platforms like Meta, Google, and TikTok all use automated systems that scan millions of ads for violations and policy compliance.
These bots often make mistakes, and the worst part is that often platforms don't give you enough info on your restriction for you to know what you did wrong. For those cases, these are the most common reasons why you are getting issues:
- Policy Violations
This is the usual one. It can be something obvious, like promoting prohibited products, or something subtle that you might not even notice at first glance. Common mistakes include making exaggerated claims, using trademarked logos, or having a landing page that is missing a privacy policy.
- Suspicious Activity
Algorithms don’t only check your content, they try and check your activity and often flag behavior that might look weird to them. This is mostly done to stop or limit bot traffic, scams, and hacking attempts. Often, triggers are simple, like logging in from another country, but you can also get flagged for things like increasing your budget a lot suddenly or having a payment method that declined multiple times.
- Circumventing Systems
This is the most vague reason. In simple terms, it means that the platform thinks you tried to somehow trick the algorithm. These could be you using special characters to hide banned keywords (like "W3ight L0ss"), just less obvious. Or creating a new ad account right after your first one was banned, using sneaky redirects on your landing page, or anything else. These are usually serious and hard to recover from, as your account is likely to be under more scrutiny in the future because of it.
- Negative User Feedback
Platforms, for the most part, listen to the feedback that they get from users. If enough people are hiding your ad or reporting it as spam, the platform will notice and shut it down.
Why A Quick Recovery Is Crucial
Getting your account back up and running fast is important. Not only for your finances, but also the sooner you fix the reasons behind the ban, the less damage it will do to your reputation.
The biggest thing that hits right away is the loss of revenue. With every hour that your account is down, you are generating fewer conversions, leads, and clicks, and getting paid nothing. For businesses that heavily rely on paid ads, this can be catastrophic.
It also kills your momentum. As your campaigns stop dead in their track, so does the algorithm pushing them. Even if they are paused for a short time, your results will be worse once they get unpaused, and the longer this period is, the worse the results. This applies account-wide, so watch out.
Getting restricted also damages your reputation with the platform. Every disapproval and especially a ban is a mark against you. Too many marks and you will get in trouble for even the smallest things. A clean record is important to have.
Step-By-Step Guide For Recovering
Okay, so now that you are banned, it's time to do something about it.
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Don’t Panic, and DO NOT Open A New Account!
Your first instinct might be to open a new account and continue business as usual. The problem with that is that it's often prohibited by platform rules to do this, and it can land you in even more trouble. You can get a hardware or IP ban as a result, which is hard to get rid of.
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Go Into Detective Mode
You need to figure out what happened so you can start working on fixing it.
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Read The Notice
What policy does it say you violated? Sadly, a lot of times the platforms give just broad, vague reasons, but sometimes you can get specific rules you crossed, and then it gets much easier to build a case to defend yourself.
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Audit Everything
Go through your disapproved ads and try finding what the issue is, and if there might be more of the same problem on your other ads or ad accounts. Check ad copy, images, videos, landing pages, and anything else you can think of to make sure you are as compliant as you can be. Check for missing privacy policies as well.
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Be Honest With Yourself
Were you pushing the boundaries a bit too hard? While you can try tricking the platforms, you shouldn't lie to yourself. It's better to admit your own mistake and find and address the issue than continue claiming you did nothing wrong.
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Write an Appeal
Ok, if you have the details, you know where you made your mistakes, and you are ready to correct them, or you think there has been a mistake, it's time to write an appeal.
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Be Calm and Respectful
Even though you are probably full of various emotions, this is not the place or time to show them. Start with a polite tone; the support rep you are contacting has likely had their fair share of angry messages for the day. Be professional and state your case.
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Be Clear and Factual
Keep it short and accurate. Don’t try to overdramatize and stick with the facts. Include any info you have managed to collect on what could be the issue with your ads. An example could be:
“My ad account [Account ID] was disabled. After reviewing, I realize my ad violated the [Policy Name] policy. This was an honest mistake. I have now deleted the ad and audited my entire account to ensure full compliance. I apologize for the error and request that my account be reinstated.”
Or:
"My ad account [Account ID] was disabled for violating [Policy Name]. I have carefully reviewed the policy and my ads, and I believe this was an error. My ads promote [Your Product] and are fully compliant. Could you please take a second look?"
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Own Your Mistakes
If you messed up, admit it and show that you are a responsible advertiser who takes the rules seriously. There is no need to deny if you really made a mistake, as they have already decided against you. Your only option is to agree with them and try to reason.
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If Your Appeal is Denied
A lot of times, the first appeal with get an automated “no”. But you shouldn't give up. Request as many appeals as you can and make sense. Your goal is to get to a human reviewer via live chat if available. Be persistent but always stay polite. You should also use any connections you have, like a contact at the platform or an agency rep.
Prevention
Recovering an ad account is difficult, so not getting banned in the first place is the best option you have! You should:
- Read the policies. You can even use AI to summarize them and explain them better to you.
- Warm up new accounts. Don’t launch super-aggressive ads on a new ad account right away. Ease into it.
- Keep your Landing pages clean and include the required information like privacy policies and ToS.
Another thing that can be super helpful is finding an AI chatbot that has a huge token context window (information they can take up) and upload the entire policies of platforms you run on. Then you can train it to recognize any issues your content might have by pasting in the scripts, ideas, and ad copy before you even launch!
Conclusion
Getting an ad account banned is something that every marketer will experience at least once. Instead of panicking and making things worse, stay calm, collect all of the data, and start building a defense for your appeal. You should also focus on preventing issues before they happen, but this is often much easier said than done. With the right strategies and approach, you can protect your ad accounts and business at least a bit, so it's worth doing!
What is the weirdest thing you got an ad account banned for? Share your story with us in the comments below!
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