I’m a Bad Boy!

You’ll notice that the Google AdSense section of my sidebar has been removed. That is because I’m a bad boy. It should have been obvious. It started to dawn on me this weekend. It is interesting that Google sorted out what I was doing even as I was figuring out that what I was doing was in violation of the rules and regulations. I’m one of those that doesn’t read the instructions. I got the email from Google AdSense activating my account. There was all this fine print – well, ok, it wasn’t really fine print – with suggestions and, at the very end, an admonition. Yeah, I didn’t read all that.

Now, in retrospect it makes perfect sense that Google does not allow web site owners or their agents to generate “invalid clicks”. More plainly, clicking on ads that appear on your own site or having people click on the ads that appear on your own site is strictly forbidden. Hum. Probably should have read that part at the beginning.

So, this morning I attempted to log into my AdSense account to see how much free money had landed in my account. What’s this? Account Disabled? Huh? No email from Google, no explanation. Interesting. Reading through the AdSense documentation I am quite certain that Google has disabled my account due to my generating invalid clicks.

As I said, this should have been obvious at the onset. It’s one of those moments when I feel kind of silly. Advertisers would want some assurance that they were actually getting what they paid for. They are paying for unique visits from interested parties. Obviously, my daily clicks on their ads did not fit that definition. The policy and Google’s enforcement of it simply ensures the value of advertising through AdSense.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens next. My account was disabled without explanation but the ads continued to work. Given that my account has been disabled, I have removed the ads from my site. I don’t want to display ads that I’m not going to get paid for. If Google re-activates my account, my might put the ads back. I’m not sure yet. This blog currently has about a 50 readers. Realistic return rates on AdSense advertising appear to be in the 1 to 5% range. This a web site will see about 1 to 5% of total impressions in clicks. Not a lot of money. It might not be worth it.

An interesting experience. Like I said, I feel a little silly. I should have realized that what I was doing could not be self-sustaining.

Aloha