Being an avid IM forum user, I enjoy discussions regarding ways to earn money online. Other than article and affiliate marketing, one of the most popular income venues are AdSense advertising on your blog or website. If you are an AdSense Publisher and you haven’t kept up with Google’s rule updates since 2008  or early 2009, it’s time to ask yourself: is your AdSense account in danger?

Unfortunately, and I keep seeing this: most AdSense Publishers seem to not bother reading the T.O.S.  in their AdSense Publisher account, and a lot of them are consistently breaking one or more of their rules, which in turn will have their account flagged and banned, eventually.

I don’t want you to become one of them, so I decided to provide a list of warning signs, things to look out for, what matters most in order to avoid having your AdSense Publisher account closed. When banned from AdSense or AdWords, it’s for life. I have heard it is more like two or three years, then maybe they will accept you back, but why take any chances?

So, is your AdSense account in danger? Below I sum up ten reasons why AdSense can have your account banned, then I’ll go on and explain why. Ultimately, it is up to you to protect yourself. I put together this list to help AdSense Publishers avoid getting banned, although it is up to you to update yourself regularly on their T.O.S. The Privacy Policy rule was added in 2009, and thousands of Publishers still ignoring it, are at risk of losing their accounts.

Ten common reasons AdSense would ban your account:

1. Your site lacks a Privacy Policy link on every page with AdSense.
2. Your site contains excessive amount of abusive language.
3. Your site provides adult content.
4. Your web pages contain no actual text content, only advertising.
5. You installed a large number of MFA sites on the same IP address.
6. You placed an AdSense block beneath the page title, Xfactor style.
7. You posted a link to a blog or website in a forum, asking for advice.
8. You ask or suggest that your visitors may click the AdSense links.
9. Your ex, friend or a close relative clicked your AdSense links.
10. Disgruntled part time Google whore employee reports your site out of spite.
11. How to get your AdSense account back if it was banned?

1. Your site lacks a Privacy Policy link on every page with AdSense.

Solution: SerpRank.com offers a free online tool for creating a customized and ready to use Personal Privacy file. Add the text to a new WP page and use the Exclude Pages plug-in to hide the visible Page link, or create a new blog post (Blogger.com) and add a link to the post in your Blogger footer.

2.  Your site contains excessive amount of profanity & abusive language.

Solution: Profanity, racial slur, personal attacks and hatred on your blog or website means a one-way ticket out of the AdSense program, so simply don’t do it. If you have to be a web bully, don’t use AdSense.

3. Your site provides adult content.

Solution: Frustrated AdSense Publisher complains he’s been banned, but is innocent. Others have a look at his website and find pornographic content and/or links to other websites with it. If you are going to publish adult content on your website, use another advertiser, Black Label Ads for instance.

4. Your web pages contain no actual text content, only advertising.

Solution: Google have always put emphasis on the importance of providing good quality content on your website. If you only add a page title followed by an AdSense block and then a couple of lines worth with typically auto-spun text, you are practically asking for a ban. Write your own unique articles and content. Google is catching up with any kind of spun text content, it is not worth the risk.

5. You install a large number of MFA sites on the same IP address.

Solution: The more AdSense blogs or websites you install on the same IP address, the bigger footprint it leaves. Even though this does not mean you are violating their T.O.S. it is an unnecessary risk. As a rule of thumb, I would install no more than five to ten domains using the same IP address. I use Host Gator, and in addition to offering affordable high quality web hosting and stellar customer support, they also offer Managed VPS hosting, with which you can scale up when your AdSense grows, with up to 32 different IP addresses.

6. You placed an AdSense block beneath the page title, Xfactor style.

Solution: Xfactor’s “Adsense Masters Course” is a popular, zero hype blueprint on how to build AdSense websites producing a high AdSense CTR, but even he advise against copying his AdSense web template, with emphasis on the large AdSense block glued beneath the page title, making it look as if the title introduces the AdSense. To avoid risking a ban because of this, add two or three lines of text between the title and the AdSense block.

7. You posted a link to a blog or website in a forum, asking for advice.

Solution: Sometimes you seek someone else’s opinion on your blog or website design and AdSense placement, but before sharing your domain URL in a forum, or anywhere at all, ask yourself: “am I willing to risk having my AdSense account banned because someone might click-bomb the ads out of spite?” This is exactly what happened in a forum I frequent; someone posted his AdSense blog’s URL to gather some advice and opinions from fellow forum members. Another member posted a disturbing response suggesting he had “helped” him getting AdSense clicks. Upon checking his blog, I found his ads were offline.

Never share the URL for your AdSense blog or website with anyone. If you want advice on ad placement and such, post screenshots. Edit out details that otherwise could reveal the location.

8. You ask or suggest that your visitors may click the AdSense links.

Solution: I hope this was too obvious for you before reading it here, but to many Publishers it still isn’t. Even if you never meant to ask visitors to your blog or website, to click the AdSense links, Google’s web spiders can crawl your site and read something as an incentive to click the AdSense ads. If in doubt, don’t write it.

9. Your ex, friend or a close relative clicked your AdSense links.

Another common and unfortunate situation. Say you mention your AdSense endeavours to your Mother, and she is utterly impressed. When doing house chores later that day, she glances into your room and sees your AdSense site on the screen. She doesn’t totally understand how this AdSense-thing works, although she grasped the part about you earning money every time someone clicks the links. Of course, she’s eager to help out…

Or, your ex is still mad after the breakup, and he or she decides to take revenge by click-bombing your AdSense links. Or it was a colleague, who hates you, someone at school, e.t.c.  Never share your AdSense URLs!

10. Disgruntled part time Google whore employee reports your site out of spite.

If you wonder what it’s like to get paid by Google for manually reviewing blogs and websites, do a common Google search. What do you see? Ugly MFA sites and parked domains. Site reviewers are only human, so don’t expect them to patiently cope with all the nastiness thrown at them every day. There is a chance they sometimes flag sites out of spite, but I very much doubt they attack those with at least semi-decent content.

What can you do to prevent this? That’s easy: provide useful content like any other website, that was not purely made for AdSense. Put some effort into it and give it a purpose, and you are safe. In theory.

11. How to get your AdSense account back if it was banned?

Solution: The short answer is: you don’t. But, as I have never fancied the “it’s impossible” mantra, I refuse to say that AdSense will not remove a ban once they have gone that far. First of all, you must contact them as soon as possible, using the information in the e-mail they sent you.

Aaron Greenspan had his Publisher account banned by AdSense, and he write a two-part story on his experience with it. Definitely an interesting read: Why I sued Google (and won)

If you have lost your AdSense Publisher account, and you truly believe it was not in violation of their T.O.S., visit this blog which provides a thorough set of step-by-step instructions that should at least give you a better chance of being reinstated by the company: How to get your disabled AdSense account back.

AdSense is NOT the ONLY solution

Becoming an AdSense Publisher is a nice way to create a cash flow for re-investing into own business, but relying on AdSense income alone is not very wise. Establish multiple income streams and prepare yourself for when the day comes, that your AdSense Publisher account is gone.

CPA networks such as Adscend Media are reliable and provide a wide range of CPA offers for blogs and websites. When building AdSense sites, have CPA networks in mind. AdSense sites can be easily converted to utilize CPA offers, in the unfortunate event that your AdSense Publisher account gets banned.