Man, I could write pages about how badly Google executes on AdSense customer service.
You'd think that for all of the smart people who work there they'd figure something out that makes sense and is fair for all involved.
I mean, without thinking too hard, things like:
- Probation periods starting at zero revenue and ramping-up based on various criteria
- No account cancellation but rather revenue throttling WITH good feedback for site/content owner to fix problems
- Paid account verification. I'm sure most of us would not mind paying a one time or annual $1,000 fee to be verified and have real customer service. If you have a real business this is nothing.
Think about the revenue throttling idea. You do something they don't approve of and your revenue is throttled down. Some feedback is provided. You make some changes. If they are adequate, revenue throttles back up. Conceptually simple.
One argument against this is that you could be teaching scammers how to work around the rules. Not so. You are teaching scammers to work within the rules. If Google is smart enough in guidance and feedback they stand to turn questionable sites into "law abiding" sites. Those who don't play by the rules get to host ads and make no revenue or nearly nothing. I think this would be a far better approach.
They also need a learning mode. I worked with someone who implemented AdSense and didn't really understand it all. He didn't really do anything violently bad. I don't remember the details, but the account got shut-down within a week. This was a case of an honest business person who probably doesn't have a single molecule of malice in his body that got treated like crap by Google for not knowing what they want. The problem is that you can't know what they want, not all of it.
There needs to be a "learning mode". Maybe the throttling period is exactly that. Make it a smoothly rising function that is driven by quality criteria that is communicated clearly and effectively. As long as you develop your site you get flags to guide you into compliance. This, to me at least, makes too much sense.
And the thing is, Google aren't losing free users or pennies with this crap. I know of one SINGLE case where Google's silly Adsense banning policies lost the Big G 6 figures a year - because they couldn't be bothered to have a human get in touch and just auto-banned. As I've mentioned elsewhere, they've dropped low 5 figures a year by disabling my Adsense account with no clear explanation why.
I really, really cannot see what the business case here is. Can anyone enlighten me?
You'd think that for all of the smart people who work there they'd figure something out that makes sense and is fair for all involved.
I mean, without thinking too hard, things like:
- Probation periods starting at zero revenue and ramping-up based on various criteria
- No account cancellation but rather revenue throttling WITH good feedback for site/content owner to fix problems
- Paid account verification. I'm sure most of us would not mind paying a one time or annual $1,000 fee to be verified and have real customer service. If you have a real business this is nothing.
Think about the revenue throttling idea. You do something they don't approve of and your revenue is throttled down. Some feedback is provided. You make some changes. If they are adequate, revenue throttles back up. Conceptually simple.
One argument against this is that you could be teaching scammers how to work around the rules. Not so. You are teaching scammers to work within the rules. If Google is smart enough in guidance and feedback they stand to turn questionable sites into "law abiding" sites. Those who don't play by the rules get to host ads and make no revenue or nearly nothing. I think this would be a far better approach.
They also need a learning mode. I worked with someone who implemented AdSense and didn't really understand it all. He didn't really do anything violently bad. I don't remember the details, but the account got shut-down within a week. This was a case of an honest business person who probably doesn't have a single molecule of malice in his body that got treated like crap by Google for not knowing what they want. The problem is that you can't know what they want, not all of it.
There needs to be a "learning mode". Maybe the throttling period is exactly that. Make it a smoothly rising function that is driven by quality criteria that is communicated clearly and effectively. As long as you develop your site you get flags to guide you into compliance. This, to me at least, makes too much sense.