Top 5 Reasons for Microsoft adCenter Editorial Disapprovals

As a Search Media Strategist, I often receive queries from advertisers about the visibility of their ads. If your ads aren’t showing, it could be due to a number of reasons but the first port of call is always to check in adCenter or adCenter Desktop to see if the ad or keyword has been disapproved. More often than not, this will be the reason your ad is not being displayed.

I’ve compiled the top 5 reasons for editorial disapprovals we’ve seen in the UK market over the past few months, with tips and advice on how to avoid disapprovals. Most of these will apply to other markets too but do check your local editorial guidelines for further information. We want to ensure that your ads are viewed by as many searchers as possible and hopefully, this will help you to achieve that!

1. Landing Page Not Relevant

There are many reasons why an ad could be disapproved for ‘Landing Page Not Relevant’. To ensure your ads are approved by our editorial verification systems, we recommend that: 

• The landing page should be highly relevant to the keyword. For example, the destination URL for the keyword ‘hotels in paris’ should be a page with a selection of hotels in Paris and not simply the travel site homepage (this also lends for a much better user experience, helping them to get to the content they’re looking for, faster). Try deep-linking your URLs.
• The ad must logically correspond with the landing page. Let’s say you’re searching for a particular brand of make-up. The destination URL should resolve to an online department store, for example, and not a garden tool website.
• Your page may be a redirect but please ensure that the final landing page content is relevant to your ad. If the content is not relevant, it could delay the approval process and consequently, the time for your ad to display.

2. Trademarked Content

Having a really strong brand within your campaigns can be one of the most effective ways to drive quality traffic to your site. As an advertiser, you should avoid bidding on keywords, or using in ads, words that would infringe on the trademark of others, other than in these circumstances:

• Reseller/Affiliate: your website sells authentic goods or services that are distributed under the trademark,
• Information site: the main purpose of your site is to provide information about goods or services represented by the trademark, and you do not sell a product or service that competes with those represented by the trademark.
• Dictionary terms that are trademarks: you are clearly using the ordinary, dictionary use of a term, and your site does not sell a product or service that competes with the owner of the trademark, for example, ‘Flash’, the program, would be able to bid on ‘Flash’, despite the brand also being a well-known household cleaning product.

3. Incorrect Grammar

When we look at the types of ads that really drive clicks, the best-performers are always punchy & well-written. When constructing your ad, it’s good practice to keep the following principles in mind to avoid having them declined for something as simple as grammar:

• Try not to go overboard with punctuation. Be careful not to use excessive exclamation points, or repeat/use unnecessary punctuation, symbols or characters.
• Ads should be written using correct grammar, with the use of numbers, letters and symbols reflected as in normal speech.
• One that can be easily forgotten...always run the spelling & grammar check before uploading!

For a complete list of symbols, you can visit the Microsoft Advertising site. And remember, grammatical disapprovals are the easiest to correct...simply amend your ad and re-upload!

4. Excessive Capitalisation

We know it’s easy to get carried away when writing ads for your fantastic products & services! To avoid having your keywords disapproved for excessive capitalisation, here are a few things to bear in mind:

• Unless referring to legitimate acronyms or registered trademarks, avoid capitalising entire words.
• Capitalise proper nouns as you normally would, for example; ‘Flights to Rome for £100 with BA’.
• Random or excessive capitalization within words is not allowed, for example; Find gReat dEals oN SofTware.

5. Disallowed Content

In order to comply with UK legislation and to create a positive experience for our search community, we implement stringent policies around content. Amongst others, the following types of keywords are currently disallowed under our content guidelines:

• Illegal Content: advertising, promoting, or facilitating illegal activity is not allowed on adCenter. Illegal activity is defined as: an act that violates a national or international law. Unacceptable content is content which Microsoft deems inappropriate to allow for advertising. This may include areas where legality is unclear or where Microsoft chooses not to be associated with the advertising of such activity. The list of such areas may be updated frequently.
• Hate Speech & Profanity: advertising that facilitates or promotes hate speech, whether directed at an individual or a group, will not be accepted, and websites containing profane language cannot be approved.
• Pharmacy & Prescription-Only Medicines: Over the Counter Medications (OTC) are permitted, provided no products with the classification of POM (Prescription Only Medicine) are advertised or available for sale through the website being advertised.

This is just a snapshot of the disapproval reasons we’ve seen recently and by becoming more familiar with our editorial policies, you can help avoid disapprovals in the future. Extensive editorial policy can be found here: http://advertising.microsoft.com/microsoft-adcenter/faqs/editorial-guidelines.

If you come across any disapprovals in your account, you should amend and re-upload these ads or keywords. If they remain disapproved, please get in touch with your support contact and they will be happy to appeal them for you. You can also leave your questions or comments on the adCenter Forum.

Thanks Sonia!

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