It is factual and widely known that more than 90 percent of Google Adsense applications are rejected or deprived approval everytime.
This is not to say the rejections are done automatically or intentionally to prevent publishers (you) from monetizing their contents on Adsense by Google.
Even though Adsense doesn’t state the exact reasons for their decisions on publishers’ applications, they try to narrow it down.
So if you are conversant and attentive, you would be able to know the exact reason(s) why your Google Adsense Application was rejected.
Unlike other ad networks like Media.net, Mgid et al, Adsense doesn’t have a minimum traffic requirement.
You can apply for adsense as long you’re getting decent traffic to your blog daily from genuine sources and most desirable; search engines.
Most of the times you are the cause of your rejected application(s).
And what causes most Adsense Application rejections is violation of Adsense Publishers and Content Policies.
When I was applying for my Adsense account and got rejected, I realized I was just doing the same thing I was rejected for.
I misinterpreted the replies I got from every rejected application; they were actually the same : Low Value Content.
I literally just thought this meant only blog posts and articles, so I just made my posts longer, and I still got same old reply.
Oh that’s right, let me walk you through my Google Adsense Application journey from my first application to when I got an approval.
My First Google Adsense Application: Rejected!
My first application was rejected and I felt really bad to be honest.
Reason: Low Value Content
It wasn’t actually the first site I ever applied for Google Adsense with. I had gotten approval for sites before, both WordPress and Blogger.
But I would say those approvals were by chance because I’m sure I don’t know why I got approved at all.
Even though I knew this, I still regarded myself someone that knew what Adsense wanted, until I was proved wrong.
I had only 10 posts on the blog and they were about 700 words long each.
They were all SEO-Optimized and some were driving traffic from Search Engines and some were just showing on SERPS without clicks.
As at this period, my blog was already more than 3 months old so it wasn’t exactly an infant blog.
My contents were a hundred percent unique, so the problem wasn’t a form of plagiarism or duplicate content.
Although, I discovered I had one or two categories that I had no post under them yet, so I removed them and applied again.
Second Adsense Application: Rejected
Since the reason stated Low Value Content in the first application, I wrote 13 more posts and even had a guest post (bad idea: he just duplicated his web content on my sure just to get backlink to his own blog).
Now I was on 24 blog posts, with a minimum of 1000 words per article and I was feeling on top of the world until I got the email of ultimate rejection.
Reason: Low Value Content
One thing about Google Adsense rejections is that they don’t come early.
I literally used 6 weeks to apply twice for Adsense for Content.
My Third Adsense Application: Rejected
At this time, I was already frustrated. I almost thought about looking for other ways to monetize my contents.
Did I say almost? Oh point of correction, I already had alternative ad networks I could use.
Nevertheless, due to the fact that I wanted Adsense only, I had to read through the links of the rejection messages carefully again.
Now I put my concentration on site navigation instead of contents.
I removed my about page and contact page from my main menu and left them on only footer menu.
This way, my main menu had only my post categories.
In addition to that, I added categories list and tag list to my footer widgets and that was all.
Well, I still got rejected and this time with the same reason: Low Value Content.
My Fourth Google Adsense Application: Approved
The review process of the 3rd trial was very short, it took only 5 days compared to the first two trials that took 14 days each to complete.
This gave me a hope that I was on the way so I was eager apply again.
This time, I only changed my theme to another one and like a charm, I applied and got approved in less than 24 hours!
How you can get Google Adsense Approval in your first trial
From the experience I have had from my four Adsense applications, these are the best practices to get I’m a single trial:
- Place your Adsense code correctly: This should have been the last point but because it’s very important, I decided to move it upfront.
You can follow all of the tips below, but if you don’t place your Adsense code correctly, none of these tips, even if done right will be checked.
There are many ways to place your Adsense code on your blog correctly that you can choose from.
- Make available the essential pages: I’m sure you’re not just knowing about this. Your About, Contact and Privacy Policy Pages are compulsory pages and criteria to comply with Adsense policies, if you want to get approved.
Make sure these pages are present on your blog and placed on your home page, preferably your Footer Menu.
Your Privacy Policy page must have all required segments, and make sure you don’t copy anyone from anywhere.
Make everything your own words, you can check our privacy policy page for ideas.
- Create quality posts: Content is king and you must have heard that a lot. There’s no reason to monetize your site if your contents are worthless and not wanted by anyone.
So do your readers a favour of providing quality contents for them. When Adsense sees this, they will be happy to associate with you.
It’s not always about the quantity; I have seen people with less than 10 but quality posts get approved and others with more than 20 posts of little to no worth get rejected.
So aim at quality and the demand for your content instead of quantity, you’ll have no problem getting an approval.
So blog about topics in demand and make sure it is unique from what others have covered.
To be on the safer side, run your contents on plagiarism checker softwares like Duplichecker to make sure you didn’t mistakenly use someone’s exact sentence.
- Use a Light and Responsive Theme: Your theme goes a long way to determine your Adsense success. From my own experience now, my former theme was in a way of my approval and I had to change it before I got approved.( I don’t know why)
If you want to get approved, don’t use a bloated theme and avoid nulled themes and plugins that will invite spams on your site.
- Make sure your site has easy navigation: Adsense gives a great importance to your site navigation because it ensures great user experience when browsing through your blog.
The navigation of your site had to do with how easy people cam find what they are looking for on your site, especially your site architecture.
Just like Google needs to understand your site architecture, users also need to know how to get to what they want on your site.
The important and useful links should be placed in locations that are easily accessible.
A trick is that, your category links and link tags should be placed in your Footer area and put some the most important ones in your Main Navigation Menu.
You can check how I placed mine to get an idea of how to do yours.
- Do not have dead links: Make sure you get rid of all your broken or dead links. They can be empty category or tag links or posts links that you recently trashed but still appear in some areas of your site.
Leaving these pages on your site can be regarded as thin contents or pages with no value, so I would advise you don’t make a mistake of allowing this.
- Classic Blog Style for Home Page: You may have a plan for your Homepage according to your business layout. But when applying for Adsense, don’t use a static homepage.
Even though this style presents all your Business Plan, it makes your Homepage content so thin and lacking of words.
- Make use of Essential Plugins: Just like themes may affect your approval, the WordPress Plugins you use may either put you a step backward or forward in your Adsense journey.
To make this aspect favour you, use only these most essential WordPress plugins to grow your blog. Remember to only use a plugin if it really matters.
- Do not use copyrighted media: You should always avoid using other people’s photos, videos, graphics etc on your blog or recreate them.
This is copyright infringement and Google Adsense really frowns at that, it could prevent your approval process.
Always make sure you use royalty-free media or design your graphics yourself using free tools.
How do I know if my Adsense account is approved?
Adsense always sends a message to indicate approval or rejection of applications, so when your site is approved, you will get an email stating that your site is ready to show ads.
If however you cannot find the email, login to your Google Adsense acount and click on Site from the left drop-down menu. You’ll see the your list of sites there, and ready will be displayed under the status if it has been approved.
Conclusion
If you can follow to all of these tips closely, you don’t have to worry about Adsense rejections again.
You should try these and give me a feedback in the comment section. If there’s any question, you can ask me as well.
