5 ms·

Google and Microsoft banned this small business. Are we meant to believe they are coordinating to step on the little guy? Despite the hundreds of thousands of s

Google and Microsoft banned this small business. Are we meant to believe they are coordinating to step on the little guy? Despite the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that do advertise successfully on these search engines? Somehow this does not seem likely to me. I suspect there is some other relevant factor that you are not telling us.

m-p-3 5y ago
It wouldn't be unheard of a small business being virtually sentenced to death because the opaque byzantine maze of unwritten rules got triggered by some keywords or automated systems. I prefer to give the benefit of the doubt here.
- thanhhaimai 5y ago
  > do not use the “get out of debt” header, because you look like a “get rich quick” scheme. It reminded me of the times when Apple nagged me about the translations in my app that was never supposed to target an english-speaking audience. Opinions are my own. Tbh, any ads with the phrase "get out of debt" sounds very shady to me. I wouldn't give it the benefits of doubt personally. > Microsoft never answered at all. After two weeks of silence I reached out to them myself, and the agent tried to be nice, but the phrase “I understand your feelings, but, I’m afraid you’re banned for life and this cannot be changed” just broke me. If two companies with 100% different spam & abuse systems detected something wrong with this ads, I have the feeling we're not hearing the full story here. Microsoft even went to the extreme of "ban-for-life".
  - fighterpilot 5y ago
    They didn't use the phrase "get out of debt".
  - robertlagrant 5y ago
    Or they exchange info. The article even says that MS banned them before they even knew what the business was.
    - dkzlv 5y ago
      Author's here. Yes, that is true and was the big red flag for me. I believe it would be in their best interest to exchange the data on potential fraudsters, because it would make their life simpler.
  - Bjartr 5y ago
    > If two companies with 100% different spam & abuse systems detected something wrong with this ads Do we know this for sure, or are we assuming they only use in-house resources to determine "suspiciousness"? Could they both be contracting out to the same third-party for some additional trustworthiness signal?
- asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
  Isn't the benefit of the doubt usually something we extend to the accused, not the accuser? :) But for what it's worth I went to Google's financial services advertising page and quickly identified at least a few items that might be the cause of an issue. It seems likely that some of these items, like providing a physical address, would also be required by Microsoft. It's also worth noting that the service seems to be offered from Russia and I know that many countries are currently sanctioning parts of the Russian economy to some degree or another, which seems possibly relevant.
  - dkzlv 5y ago
    Thanks for the support. It's hard to defend against all the people that keep screaming to my face that I'm the scam here. > Google's financial services advertising page Can you give me the link? > It's also worth noting that the service seems to be offered from Russia That is true. But Google is available in Russia and allows businesses to buy ads without any limits. I know a Russian service called raindrop.io (bookmark sync app) that buys ads in Google and runs a worldwide service, and they get no bans.
    - dogma1138 5y ago
      Here you go https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/2464998?hl=en-GB https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/2464998?hl=en-GB Also if you intend to advertise in countries with stricter requirements e.g. the UK or the EU there are additional obligations you need to meet such as business verification: https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/9703665#901 https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/9703665#901
      - dkzlv 5y ago
        Oh, yeah, thanks, but those should not be applied to us. Probably. > For the purposes of this policy, we consider financial products and services to be those related to the management or investment of money and cryptocurrencies, including personalised advice We don't do anything of this kind. We're basically an excel spreadsheet with your expenses, no "money" actually involved here.
LegitShady 5y ago
I can't find it now but I'm 100% sure I heard during congressional testimoney that some social media and other tech companies have their 'trust and safety' (or whatever their company calls it) share information with other companies. It's possible that getting banned by google can lead to getting banned by microsoft if microsoft is doing some kind of trust score and being banned by another company lowers that trust score. I can't find the social media 'trust and safety' info sharing thing now it might have been zuckerberg congressional testimony (for whatever that's worth)
josefx 5y ago
> Despite the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that do advertise successfully on these search engines? In other words: The existence of hundreds of thousands of happy white people make it unlikely that a black guy could get targeted by two racists. Clearly cop A who allegedly broke his right leg and cop B who allegedly broke his left leg are to be found not guilty asap so they wont have to miss their biweekly KKK meetup. /s The most hilarious part about the comment is the implication that the greats of silicon valley haven't been repeatedly caught in various shady backroom dealings meant to enrich themselves at the cost of literally everyone else on the planet.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
  I don't understand how preventing this business from giving Google money is meant to enrich Google? It's fine to suggest a nefarious scheme here, but surely we need to choose one more complex than raw profit, since it seems like Google and MS are declining to profit from specifically this company, right? Also, FWIW, I have found that it doesn't usually go over well to compare my non-civil rights struggle with civil rights struggles. It just . . . you know, it implies a level of injustice that simply isn't supportable and it doesn't come off right. Just my 2c.
  - josefx 5y ago
    > I don't understand how preventing this business from giving Google money is meant to enrich Google? The effects do not always have to be immediate, Google once got caught reducing its labor pool by agreeing not to hire from the competition. At first glance you would think that less workers would result in higher wages when it actually fucked over the workers a dozen times harder because they could no longer get alternative jobs in the area.
    - asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
      Seems like a stretch tbh. I cannot think of a way that banning or not banning a small budget tracking company will materially affect the top line for the better.
Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
> I suspect there is some other relevant factor that you are not telling us. Not necessarily, My MS Ad account I created for a product in my previous startup was not approved because I didn't enable international payments on my debit card(India) and it was declined 'once'. No second attempts, No means to add another card. Support just said 'Sorry we cannot enable your account'. The product eventually got selected for acceleration by a FAANG company and did well. So it's MS loss that it failed to earn some money from me, But I understand that this could be fatal for a small business relying on these Internet custodians and they making flawed arbitrary decisions.

m-p-3 5y ago

It wouldn't be unheard of a small business being virtually sentenced to death because the opaque byzantine maze of unwritten rules got triggered by some keywords or automated systems. I prefer to give the benefit of the doubt here.

thanhhaimai 5y ago
> do not use the “get out of debt” header, because you look like a “get rich quick” scheme. It reminded me of the times when Apple nagged me about the translations in my app that was never supposed to target an english-speaking audience. Opinions are my own. Tbh, any ads with the phrase "get out of debt" sounds very shady to me. I wouldn't give it the benefits of doubt personally. > Microsoft never answered at all. After two weeks of silence I reached out to them myself, and the agent tried to be nice, but the phrase “I understand your feelings, but, I’m afraid you’re banned for life and this cannot be changed” just broke me. If two companies with 100% different spam & abuse systems detected something wrong with this ads, I have the feeling we're not hearing the full story here. Microsoft even went to the extreme of "ban-for-life".
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  They didn't use the phrase "get out of debt".
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  Or they exchange info. The article even says that MS banned them before they even knew what the business was.
  - dkzlv 5y ago
    Author's here. Yes, that is true and was the big red flag for me. I believe it would be in their best interest to exchange the data on potential fraudsters, because it would make their life simpler.
- Bjartr 5y ago
  > If two companies with 100% different spam & abuse systems detected something wrong with this ads Do we know this for sure, or are we assuming they only use in-house resources to determine "suspiciousness"? Could they both be contracting out to the same third-party for some additional trustworthiness signal?
asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
Isn't the benefit of the doubt usually something we extend to the accused, not the accuser? :) But for what it's worth I went to Google's financial services advertising page and quickly identified at least a few items that might be the cause of an issue. It seems likely that some of these items, like providing a physical address, would also be required by Microsoft. It's also worth noting that the service seems to be offered from Russia and I know that many countries are currently sanctioning parts of the Russian economy to some degree or another, which seems possibly relevant.
- dkzlv 5y ago
  Thanks for the support. It's hard to defend against all the people that keep screaming to my face that I'm the scam here. > Google's financial services advertising page Can you give me the link? > It's also worth noting that the service seems to be offered from Russia That is true. But Google is available in Russia and allows businesses to buy ads without any limits. I know a Russian service called raindrop.io (bookmark sync app) that buys ads in Google and runs a worldwide service, and they get no bans.
  - dogma1138 5y ago
    Here you go https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/2464998?hl=en-GB https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/2464998?hl=en-GB Also if you intend to advertise in countries with stricter requirements e.g. the UK or the EU there are additional obligations you need to meet such as business verification: https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/9703665#901 https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/9703665#901
    - dkzlv 5y ago
      Oh, yeah, thanks, but those should not be applied to us. Probably. > For the purposes of this policy, we consider financial products and services to be those related to the management or investment of money and cryptocurrencies, including personalised advice We don't do anything of this kind. We're basically an excel spreadsheet with your expenses, no "money" actually involved here.

LegitShady 5y ago

I can't find it now but I'm 100% sure I heard during congressional testimoney that some social media and other tech companies have their 'trust and safety' (or whatever their company calls it) share information with other companies. It's possible that getting banned by google can lead to getting banned by microsoft if microsoft is doing some kind of trust score and being banned by another company lowers that trust score. I can't find the social media 'trust and safety' info sharing thing now it might have been zuckerberg congressional testimony (for whatever that's worth)

josefx 5y ago

> Despite the hundreds of thousands of small businesses that do advertise successfully on these search engines? In other words: The existence of hundreds of thousands of happy white people make it unlikely that a black guy could get targeted by two racists. Clearly cop A who allegedly broke his right leg and cop B who allegedly broke his left leg are to be found not guilty asap so they wont have to miss their biweekly KKK meetup. /s The most hilarious part about the comment is the implication that the greats of silicon valley haven't been repeatedly caught in various shady backroom dealings meant to enrich themselves at the cost of literally everyone else on the planet.

asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
I don't understand how preventing this business from giving Google money is meant to enrich Google? It's fine to suggest a nefarious scheme here, but surely we need to choose one more complex than raw profit, since it seems like Google and MS are declining to profit from specifically this company, right? Also, FWIW, I have found that it doesn't usually go over well to compare my non-civil rights struggle with civil rights struggles. It just . . . you know, it implies a level of injustice that simply isn't supportable and it doesn't come off right. Just my 2c.
- josefx 5y ago
  > I don't understand how preventing this business from giving Google money is meant to enrich Google? The effects do not always have to be immediate, Google once got caught reducing its labor pool by agreeing not to hire from the competition. At first glance you would think that less workers would result in higher wages when it actually fucked over the workers a dozen times harder because they could no longer get alternative jobs in the area.
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
    Seems like a stretch tbh. I cannot think of a way that banning or not banning a small budget tracking company will materially affect the top line for the better.

Abishek_Muthian 5y ago

> I suspect there is some other relevant factor that you are not telling us. Not necessarily, My MS Ad account I created for a product in my previous startup was not approved because I didn't enable international payments on my debit card(India) and it was declined 'once'. No second attempts, No means to add another card. Support just said 'Sorry we cannot enable your account'. The product eventually got selected for acceleration by a FAANG company and did well. So it's MS loss that it failed to earn some money from me, But I understand that this could be fatal for a small business relying on these Internet custodians and they making flawed arbitrary decisions.