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Reasons for Ad and Ad Account Blocking on Instagram and Facebook
May 30, 2024
10 mins
Meta is a corporation that owns one of the world's most famous social networks, Facebook and Instagram. According to a study in 2024, the potential reach of Facebook ads increased by +7.8%, and Instagram by +12.7%.
To ensure that these positive statistics continue to grow, Meta closely monitors advertisers' activities, checks account information and the advertising campaign itself, and when violations are detected, restricts or blocks the account in Ads Manager.
We have prepared an article with Promodo PPC specialist Yuriy Dederchuk about the not always obvious reasons for blocking an account, and discussed what to do when it seems that your ad account was disabled for no reason.
First, you need to understand how Meta platforms and advertising are interconnected. Most often, Ads Manager is used for advertising promotion - it creates an advertising account based on an existing Facebook account. If your business is represented on Instagram and you use targeted advertising on this social network, you also link Instagram to your ad account. In the future, if you promote your posts directly in the social media feed, your advertising activity will be credited to your existing advertising account.
This is important because Meta monitors the actions, violations, and complaints against the account. It has its own rating in the system, which can also influence additional attention or scrutiny from Meta. Blocking can have various consequences for the advertiser: from freezing ads and suspending advertising campaigns to complete account deactivation.
In general, the reasons for blocking can be divided into four categories:
You can read about all the rules for advertising from Meta here, and now we'll analyze the most common problems advertisers face.
This is the most common reason for account restriction and blocking that is not directly related to advertising. Meta closely monitors payment methods and bank account information, and since the checks are automatic, seemingly unobvious details can cause an account to be frozen. If a certain number of cards are already linked to the advertising account:
When you link a new payment method or create a new advertising account, Meta may restrict your account in cases where:
Since Meta checking is based on machine learning, the algorithms are not perfect. And the reason for blocking, which seems logical to the system, may not be so obvious if a person were to check it.
“Recently, we had a payment blocked because it looked suspicious. To pay for advertising, a large number of cards are often linked to an account, in part because of restrictions on the amount that can be charged to a card. We linked a new card, and the system treated the payment from it as a “suspicious payment” and restricted our account to protect us from hacking.
Meta support responded to this situation by saying that the card numbers could match cards banned from the system or the number could be similar to other banks. In short, it is a very confusing circle where Meta tries to protect the owner of the advertising account, but sometimes it only makes things worse. After all, it can take more than one day to unblock an account, and this has a direct impact on our work.”
Yuriy Dederchuk
Middle PPC Specialist in Promodo
All actions with payment methods are recorded within the system and affect the reputation of your advertising account. For example, if one of the cards does not have enough money to pay for the services, Meta will stop the ads and notify you about it. But if you don't react quickly, the system will make several attempts to withdraw the payment and this situation will repeat several times - Meta can permanently block your ad account.
Among the most common situations that Meta considers as suspicious activities are:
Newly created accounts. It is not recommended to connect new accounts with no history to your ad account, as they are less trustworthy. It is best to fill in the page details, add friends, subscribe to groups to make the page look real, and only then add it to Ads Manager.
New accounts with high activity. While your account is new, attention is focused on it, so when you link it to your Ads Manager account, it is advisable not to do too many actions. Don't create multiple ad campaigns and set large budgets at the same time, as Meta may consider these actions as an intruder and block your account for security reasons.
Logging in from a new country. If you and your colleagues always work within the same region, and then you log in from another country, this can cause a block. Therefore, in such cases, it is recommended to use a VPN with the region from which the activity usually takes place.
Accounts with suspicious activity. These can be new pages whose owners have previously violated Meta rules on other accounts. The system monitors the connection between them and blocks the ad account if it sees that a page with a dubious reputation is among its administrators.
To create an ad that will be approved by the system, it is enough to depict a product or service in a picture and create a unique selling proposition. From the image, the user should be able to understand what the ad is about, and read additional information in the description text if necessary.
One of the main rules of Meta is user safety, so advertising gray and black niches is prohibited. But there are also categories of goods and services that have special rules for advertising. They do not pose a direct danger, but their advertising can misinform the consumer, and therefore the system considers it dangerous.
“Meta prohibits the use of the audience selection tool in certain categories (housing search, job search, and social issues). According to the rules, all users must have access to advertising in these categories, so if you, for example, advertise housing rentals and create a special audience, this may cause a block.”
Yuriy Dederchuk
Middle PPC Specialist in Promodo
Also, keep in mind that a complaint about an ad may come to an ad that has already been approved by Meta from a user. In this case, it will be suspended and re-moderated.
When moderating an ad, Meta checks the landing page to which the ad leads. The subject matter of the site should correspond to the advertised product, and if you advertise a specific product, the link should lead to this page, not the main page.
It is also forbidden to use redirects and auto redirects to PDF or JPG files.
Before you run an ad, Meta checks the ad content (images, text, targeting settings) and your business resources (it can be an ad account, account, or even a website). They must comply with the community rules.
If there are no obvious problems, the verification is quick, but it can take up to 24 hours. At this stage, the ad has the status “Under review”. Ads can also be checked after they are published - automatically or following a user complaint.
If an ad fails to pass moderation, it will be rejected. But you can appeal for re-verification - sometimes it works, and sometimes it leads to blocking the entire advertising account.
Many things are restored on request, but even when communicating with support, it can be difficult to find out the reason for the block. For example, they see that the account has been blocked before, and in some cases this can be the basis for blocking, without any further explanation. It can be difficult and sometimes impossible to understand their logic.
Yuriy Dederchuk
Middle PPC Specialist in Promodo
In other words, the course of events can be different and unpredictable. But at whatever stage you get a restriction or blocking, you need to know the order of the following actions and act quickly.
Regardless of the decision to restrict or block, you have the right to appeal. As long as you communicate with different support managers and have the opportunity to appeal again, you still have a chance to unblock. You should defend your case and explain that there was no violation.If Meta decides to permanently block your account, you have no choice but to create a new page and lose your account.
Yuriy Dederchuk
Middle PPC Specialist in Promodo
Important: if Meta has blocked your personal Facebook page, you can save your ad account by unlinking it from the page in time. The same goes for Instagram pages.
You can request a review or appeal in the Account quality section. Select Review account status and the business account that has been restricted or blocked.
You can also contact Support.
Feedback after the first appeal usually arrives in a few hours, and communication with Meta managers is also fast. However, the subsequent decision on unblocking can take up to 3 days
The most important thing is to file an appeal right away. This way, you will win some time for yourself. If I see that Meta sends a restriction, I first go to review the campaign myself. I try to understand why the ad was restricted and whether there was a human error. If I don't find a visible reason, I send a request for a second check, and usually the ads are launched on their own after a while. When this does not happen, I communicate with support.
Yuriy Dederchuk
Middle PPC Specialist in Promodo
Journalist at Promodo
For over 4 years, I have been working as a journalist in the communications and marketing industry. I help brands communicate effectively through written content, engage with market experts, and create professional materials on topics related to business and marketing, sharing insights on working with marketing tools.
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