2 Ways to Get Your Suspended Google Ads Account Back up

On 2 separate occasions, I had my Google Ads account suspended (and reinstated thanks to the 2 options I’ll show you) and I am one of many who has had this unfortunate experience.

While some reasons for why Google Ads shuts down accounts are justified, in my personal case, as well as cases from close friends and other stories I hear, it can be quite unjustified.

Whatever the case, you’re reading this now because you are in that spot and you want to know how to get your Google Ads account back from that suspension and I’m about to share how I did it:

Here are the 2 methods I used to get my suspended Google Ads account restored:

Ways to restore a suspended google ads account

  1. Call up Google Ads support, and ask to be reinstated.
  2. Open up a new Google Ads account under a different credit card or via a different person and use their credit card.

In my particular case, the first time I had my account suspended, I used option 2 to get it back, and when it got suspended a second time, I relied on option 1 to get it back again. But I was forced to use these methods “backwards” because Google Ads didn’t have a reliable customer service when my first suspension happened.

In your case, go with option 1 first and only rely on option 2 if the first one fails.

But before you try either of these 2 things, I really advise reading this whole article because towards the end of it, I will share an important 3rd tip that involves hedging your business against these kinds of situations, which is honestly the best move you can make to keep your online business going in the long run!

3 reasons your Google Ads account got suspended (how to not repeat past mistakes):

call up google ads support

1) You violated one or more of the TOS Google Ads has up:

Any justified suspension of a Google Ads account will occur because of this reason and a lot of people have no clue if they’re actually violating the TOS for Google Ads, because most people just don’t even read them.

You can read the full terms and conditions for Google Ads here, but in short, you aren’t allowed to make ads promoting or selling the following things:

  1. Get rich quick schemes.
  2. Questionable cures to diseases that aren’t really popular.
  3. Gambling or illegal products and services (adult stuff included).
  4. And miscellaneous other things.
  5. You need to make ads that are actually relevant to your product or what you’re selling.

One of the reasons both of my accounts got suspended was because I was doing affiliate marketing work on Google Ads and promoting things that they classified into the first 2 categories above.

In my opinion this was not the case, but it’s very hard to fight against Google once they levy their decision. In any case, be very careful with what you promote or sell on Google Ads if you wish to keep your account up and running.

Because if it does get suspended unjustifiably, you can argue your case with their support team and have a better chance of getting it back.

Note on affiliate marketing:

Some people speculate Google Ads doesn’t like when affiliate marketers try to advertise on their platform.

My experience with it has proven to be true when I got suspended, as they said I was promoting “questionable offers”, but in the last few years, I have noticed many more affiliate sites advertising there, and from my knowledge, there is no specific violation in their TOS for doing affiliate marketing on Google Ads, so it is worth a shot if you’re already in this business.

2) You didn’t violate any TOS, but were just one of the many unlucky people who got hit with a suspension.

This is where I feel I was placed into with both of my suspensions and I dare say it’s probably why you’re here reading this now too.

Yes, it is absolutely true in my experience that Google Ads does shut down many accounts unjustifiably and their first “purge” when they did this took out MILLIONS of accounts, lots of which didn’t violate any rules to my knowledge.

  • And this major event was sort of a blessing for myself and the future of this PPC network, and that’s because:
  • For me, it made me expand my online business beyond the Google Ads realm.

All of the bad rep Google Ads got for doing this to their users made them strongly rethink and change up their policies, including adding an actual support number you could call for these types of problems (they didn’t have such a thing originally).

But yes, unjustified suspensions happen and less today than before, but there are numerous reasons such a thing can happen to you today. If it does, use the first method above.

3) Your ad may have gotten a complaint or someone in Google Ads saw your ad and subjectively thought your account should be suspended.

Nearly every ad you put up on Google Ads has to go through a review, and sometimes it is a manual one. If the automatic one doesn’t flag you, a manual one can (and vice versa). Or someone may complain about your ad too and this can also produce problems (not in my experience though but it’s possible).

If this is the reason you get shut out of your account, then again, use the first method above.

Beware of fake people claiming that they’ll get your Google Ads account back up:

Before I show you the 2 methods that are legitimate at getting your Google Ads account back up, let me share a very important issue I’ve noticed:

When I made a YouTube video concerning how to restore your Google Ads account, I noticed it getting a lot of views and many of the comments on that video were spammers and fakers trying to claim that:

“If you contact so and so on a social network, they’ll get your account back up”.

This is false and it reeks of a scam. Beware of any person who says they’ll be able to do this for you, because odds are, they’ll likely ask for money and claim they have some sort of “code” or “insider ability” to fix your account. This is just NOT how it works so never fall for this.

I see tons and tons of fake spam accounts on my video comments claiming this, so just disregard it. Know that the 2 methods I’m giving you are honestly the only 2 ways to fix this problem legitimately without spending anything extra on the process.

The 2 methods to get your Google Ads account reinstated work (but aren’t guaranteed):

1) Call up Google Ads directly and try to get them to reinstate the account:

The last time I checked, they do have an official number. This method works because you can actually argue your case with a real person on the phone and I strongly recommend you go the phone route, because emailing takes too long (or it goes in a loop where you can’t get to who you want to reinstate your account).

Here is a source for the Google Ads support number.

Note: Be polite! Don’t scream or be rude, no matter how justified you feel.

The better you are at speaking your case politely, will make it easier for them to WANT to help you.

If you find the customer support agent from Google Ads isn’t really being helpful (there’s been cases where I heard or experienced this), escalate your issue and ask for a supervisor.

The supervisor may expedite your situation and get your account reinstated faster, but again, only go this route if the regular customer service agent isn’t being helpful.

2) The second method (making a new account).

open a new google ad account

Its a distant plan B, but it works and should only be used as a last resort if you’ve tried your best to reinstate your suspended account through option A.

In my case, I was forced to use this method back when my first suspension happened and this was because there was no option A.

I couldn’t call anyone, and in most cases, my emails got automated responses and the few times I was actually able to get a real person from Google Ads to email me, they told me their decision was final and/or referred me to their vague TOS.

Believe me, whatever you’re going through right now with your suspension, I’ve been there and felt it and I know your frustration very well.

In fact, the YouTube video I made on this topic has gotten a lot of comments and many of them are saying the official Google Ads page doesn’t even have a contact number.

If this is what you’re seeing too, check the support number link I provided above and you’ll get it.

I totally get your frustration and there really is a lot Google needs to do to improve this area of their service.

Check to see if your Google Ads account is really suspended. This is why:

There are accounts that aren’t actually suspended, but are in fact just deleted, cancelled or disabled, and those are entirely different than suspensions. If you don’t see a message on your Google Ads account that says suspended, then it is either one of the other 3 things, for which there are solutions to:

Here is a tutorial to get your Google Ads account back if it’s been cancelled, disabled or deleted.

The big picture: Stop relying on Google Ads if you want your business to thrive!

My 2 account suspensions with Google Ads throttled and honestly forced me to find news ways to make money online and regrow my online business from scratch and the lesson I learned was to never rely on one method to make money online, because these types of things, like account suspensions happen.

In fact, aside from my Google situation, I did experience plenty of other setbacks in my business, including issues with:

  • Bing Ads suspending my account.
  • Rankings loss from my websites.
  • And plenty of other similar situations.

This type of stuff is normal for any online business person and affiliate marketer, but at the same time, while ever problem has a resolution to it, relying on 1 method to make your money is a huge mistake and all it takes is one button to shut down everything you’re making.

Believe me when I say I know how that feels and it’s a horrible feeling no one seeking to make passive income with affiliate marketing or with their online business should ever have to go through (especially when they know better). So this is what I’m trying to say:

Rely on multiple methods to make money online instead of just on Google Ads:

If my tutorial on reinstating your account works for you, great. But even if you get it back, whose to say this won’t happen again?

I strongly advise you to consider other means of getting traffic and money to your business because at any point, your account can get shut down.

In case, since my 2 account suspensions occurred (and were fixed), I moved out of the Google Ads realm and learned the following new ways to make money for my business:

That’s 7 or more new ways of making money to keep and grow my affiliate business that are already making me money and if Google Ads fails me again, I can shrug it off. And even if one of these 7 other methods also fails, I can still rely on the others.

And that’s really where you want to be if you want to succeed long term in this business. You don’t have to honestly do all the things I’m doing, but have at least 1 or 2 alternative methods of making money with your business, outside of Google Ads.

  • I recommend other pay per click networks for starters, especially for affiliate marketers.
  • And I would recommend you get into blogging if your business is built for it.

Those 2 things alone can be a great substitute for Google Ads should the worst case scenario arrive. And if you want good training for all of these networks and methods to make money online (especially as an affiliate), then see Wealthy Affiliate.

They educated me on all of the above methods to succeed online and by following that training, I got the results I have today.

What happened after my Google Ad accounts got reinstated:

1) The first time I experienced a suspension, it was a total disaster and I went broke and yes, I was really depressed over this.

2) The second time it happened, I shrugged it off because I had already invested the time to keep my business afloat with one or more of the methods above (and thanks to investing time in the training I got in Wealthy Affiliate).

3) And today, I honestly don’t even do Google Ads much. I have gotten into YouTube Ads which is a branch of it, but I don’t focus much on Google Ads thankfully, because I just don’t have that need to rely on it anymore.

Notice how because I diversified my income in my affiliate business, and expanded beyond just doing Google Ads, I basically liberated myself from it and this is really the best place to be in this regard:

  • At any point, I can go back, log into my Google Ad account since it’s been reinstated and run some new ads.
  • And even if I get suspended or my ads don’t get approved, I can still shrug all of that off because I have my other branches keeping my business going.

And that makes me look back at my suspensions and feel grateful, because those 2 events that suspended my account pushed me to expand my online business.

More on suspended Google ad accounts:

How do I fix my suspended Google account?

The ideal thing to do is to reach out to Google Ad customer support and request a reinstatement.

Can I make a new Google Ads account after suspension?

If you can reinstate your Google Ad account, then you don’t need to make a new one. But if you can’t the only way to make a new account is through a different user.

How long does a Google suspension last?

Technically a Google suspension is indefinite whether is be an ad account or SEO site unless you are able to contact them and reverse it.

The final point on this subject of Google Ads:

Even if what I suggested you do to fix your Google Ads suspension works, I’d really recommend following in the same footsteps I did after it happened to me and invest the time to learn about the other options out there.

Some of them might make you even more than Google Ads on it’s own and with all the risks you run of losing your account, it’s worth doing it (start with Wealthy Affiliate to hedge yourself against these situations).

Note: Here is an updated Google Ads affiliate marketing tutorial I’ve created to help you succeed there. Hopefully if you can get your account reinstated, you can use this tutorial.

4 thoughts on “2 Ways to Get Your Suspended Google Ads Account Back up”

  1. Thank you, Vitaliy for your detailed answer

    I watched videos to some marketers on YouTube promoting Clickbank supplements on Google Ads. I don’t think they have a certification that Google requires but I wouldn’t risk losing my account so I wouldn’t imitate them anyway cause I do not know their circumstances.

    But if you have a blog in the nutrition and fitness niche and you have published reviews about some nutritional supplements for SEO ONLY, not for Google ads.

    Assuming that Google ads do not allow advertising for these supplements.

    At the same time, if you have published a review of fitness equipment on the same blog, can you launch a google ads campaign for this fitness equipment?

    I ask this question because I read that Google ads looks at the entire website, not the landing page only.

    If the review of the supplement is on the blog for SEO purposes only, is it possible that Google Ads will not approve the fitness equipment ad campaign because there is a review of the OTC supplement on the blog?

    Reply
    • Hi Sam, this is a hard thing to answer (again) because Google Ads has been very contradictory in their actions as you already know. If they did adhere to their own policy and/if it were detailed for your situation, then I would say you should be fine promoting fitness products whereas, health supplements or medical stuff would likely require a certificate.

      From the past I do know that having a blog website increases the odds your site/ad gets approved. But I have also seen mixed evidence suggesting that if they think your site is an affiliate page, they may disapprove it too (It’s happened to me).

      Overall, I think you’re trying to balance yourself on ground that’s constantly moving and if you’re serious about building an online business, that you shouldn’t be putting all that focus on Google Ads alone. In fact, very little of your online business should be focused on that in my opinion.

      Reply
  2. Hi Vitaliy

    Thank you again for your great content.

    I have a question that confused me very much, and I searched on the web to find a definitive and accurate answer to it, but I didn’t find that answer. This prompted me to go to Google customer service and contact more than one Google employee to find the answer.

    But the result was shocking, every employee told me a different answer. It seems that they do not know the exact answer to this question, which can cause the suspend of the Google Ads account if you are not sure of its answer.

    This question is related to the promotion of nutritional supplements as an affiliate marketer, which Google classifies as OTC and does not require a prescription.

    I have read Google’s policies well in this regard, but Google did not give an accurate answer. Google asks online pharmacies to apply for certification so that they can promote medicines.

    First Question: Does Google consider blogs that publish informative posts and articles about nutrition, health, and fitness as online pharmacies?

    Do I need to apply for certification to be able to promote a review of a safe nutritional supplement on my blog using Google ads?

    Currently, there are supplements on ClickBank. Can I write a review about one of them and launch a campaign on Google Ads?

    Have you ever promoted a nutritional supplement on Google Ads?

    Second Question: If it is not allowed to directly to promote nutritional supplements on Google ads, Does the mere presence of a review of a safe supplement on my blog prevent me from launching an ad campaign on Google Ads for products other than supplements such as degrees and fitness tools?

    Is it possible for me to lose my Google Ads account forever because there are nutritional supplement reviews on my blog, or are there marketers who have been promoting nutritional supplements using Google Ads?

    Reply
    • Hi Sam, I’m going to give you the best answers I can provide on your situation but it is based on my personal experience with Google on different angles (SEO, Google Ads, Google Adsense and basic experience). And while you did officially ask 2 questions, there are a bit more within each one so I’ll address it in more than 2 answers (don’t worry about it though).

      1) For your question on blogs publishing health related content considered pharmacies by Google, I don’t think they do. Not unless you are literally promoting medicine. However as you already know, Google doesn’t always give a definitive answer to these questions.

      My assumption based on your experience is that you are promoting what they flagged as a questionable promotion (from Clickbank). That or your account on Google Ads is flagged for promoting health related stuff, which they classify as medicine or pharmaceutical in which case you would have to get in touch with them and possibly escalate/dispute their decision but I would honestly say it’s not worth it because I’ve had numerous instances where they didn’t accept my reasoning and it’s just one of those situations where even if you’re right, their word is final (it’s sad, I know).

      2) For your question on applying for a certificate, I’m not sure, but if you’re serious about this promotion and want to do it through Google Ads, the answer might be yes. I would carefully analyze the time and energy you put into this because Google Ads is a lot of red tape in this regard so even if you do get the certification and the ad does run, your next problem would be making the promotion make money (it’s not easy these days).

      3) For your question on reviewing Clickbank supplements and promoting them on Google Ads, I honestly doubt it would go through given the nature of the way they easily flag accounts which promote this and Clickbank from my understanding doesn’t have the best reputation with paid ads (You may want to consider Bing Ads).

      4) For your question on me promoting similar things, the answer is no, but I have had situations where I was promoting a make money online program which they flagged and said it violated their TOS because it was some get rich quick scheme, and I tried to convince them differently because it wasn’t, but no matter how many facts I gave the rep, it still didn’t go through and that led to my second account suspension.

      You gotta understand that sometimes you’re dealing with a massive bureaucratic system that doesn’t give specific answers and this is when I said I had enough of Google Ads and moved onto SEO and other paid ad networks. Sometimes the stress of figuring out what they approve isn’t worth it.

      5) For your question on promoting a supplement on Google Ads getting in the way of getting other ads for other products in different niches approved, I’m not sure, but one violation of their TOS can trickle down to a potential account suspension in my experience. It’s tough to say because not even their own reps know the inner workings of what’s specifically allowed often (And I’m being nice about those experiences, let me tell you).

      6) For your question on an account suspension if other people are promoting medical supplements, again, a mixed answer. You may end up seeing ads for truly suspicious medicine approved by Google Ads, then try to promote a legitimate one and get flagged/suspended for it simply because this is the nature of the program you’re working with. This has been my experience with Google Ads in the past with the make money online program (got my ad disapproved, then ad account suspended but saw true scams being approved sometimes).

      7) Overall, I would not put so much focus on Google Ads as being the solution to your affiliate marketing business. Very often, it can be more difficult to work with than not and like I said before, an ad approval does not mean your ad will convert well either. PPC is a dangerous game for affiliates, so I would consider other realms in addition to this (if you get approved for the ad that is).

      For me, other PPC networks and SEO is the route I went with and in regards to the SEO part, be careful with making any blog talking about medicine because you will likely be outranked by medical websites and get far less traffic in the long run. They pushed out a major update called E-A-T years ago which pushed authority sites in questionable topics (like medicine) to basically only push certified sites and not some affiliate pages which promote medicines.

      Sorry I can’t be of more help, but do know that I can personally relate to your situation.

      Reply

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