Ads get rejected constantly on Facebook. This is commonplace and expected.
Regardless of the business you’re in, ads are bound to get rejected. The experience can be jarring at first, but it quickly becomes part of routine advertising.
Most businesses that I’ve worked with have had ads rejected for one reason or another.
This is completely normal and not something you should panic about. But, there are ways to make sure that you are doing your best to maintain compliance, without sacrificing conversions.
Facebook Ad Rejects ANYTHING that hints at a Facebook Policy Violation
When you first submit an ad to Facebook for review, it gets crawled by the AI and machines.
It’s not actually reviewed by a human. Oftentimes it gets rejected for a reason that we don’t quite understand.
Ads get rejected for usage of certain words, or even the juxtaposition of certain words as seen by the machines. If there is even a hint of policy violation, your ad can get rejected.
The algorithm and AI “read and transcribe” your videos and read all your primary text, headlines and scan your images for any words. It does pick up on certain keywords that can trigger ads to be rejected.
Such as the machine thinking we advertise “Adult Products or Services”.
I can assure you, we do not. but the machines certainly think we do.
Unless there’s a secret hidden product that I am unaware of.
Here are some additional reasons that the machines love to reject ads for:
- Ads About Social Issues, Elections or Politics
- Unrealistic Outcomes
- Discriminatory Practices
Of course, these are vague and ambiguous statements that really don’t help much in this context. It really doesn’t help us understand what Facebook Ad Policies we violated or what we can do to mitigate it in the present or in the future.
Indeed, often times when these ads get rejected, a quick appeal brings the ad in front of human eyes to review. When doing this, it’s important to ensure that you think you didn’t violate anything major. If you did, you could risk getting your account banned via a human review.
You can appeal ads one by one in the ads manager, or by bulk in the account quality menu item in the hamburger menu in the business manager.
Either way, once you appeal the rejected ad, the ad is officially reviewed and if you feel that it is not in violation of any policy, it will most likely get re-approved.
If your ads don’t get re-approved, don’t worry. Just modify the thing that you think is the offending piece of the creative, and re-upload that creative. This will remove the creative from the “unchanged” folder and resubmit it as a fresh ad for approvals. After you resubmit the ad and it still gets rejected and falls into the “unchanged” folder and has a “rejected” status in the ads manager, just delete it. Deleting rejected ads is a great way to keep your account clean and tidy in the eyes of the reviewers. Delete them for peace of mind.
If your ads continue to get rejected, maybe it’s time to try a blank headline and primary text and just run your creative video or image asset. This will help you rule out whether it’s the copy or the creative.
As of lately, the Facebook/Meta spam filter and approvals filter have been cranked wayyy up, so it’s important to ensure your ads are compliant out of the gates before you start jamming the review button.
This process can be extremely frustrating to deal with, but this is the new normal of advertising on Facebook’s platform. To help prevent your account from getting banned, I put together a brief list of things to do and things to avoid. I call this…
This isn’t going to prevent your account from getting banned if your business is truly non compliant. But, these guidelines are here to help you better understand what is allowed, and what is not allowed on the platform. Keep in mind, these are just guidelines, and don’t work 100% of the time.
How to help prevent your Facebook Ads from being Rejected.
- Don’t imply that you know anything about the users. In general, avoid using words like “other”, “you”, “yours”
- Don’t call out your audience or anything that could be identifiable by your targeting. (ATTENTION COACHES, etc.)
- Don’t use language to position offers that sound too good to be true, even if they are true (FREE FUNNEL, $0 Up Front, just $97 bucks)
- Don’t use 5 Star Emoijs ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ I know they look cool, might even boost conversions, and emulate a true 5 star experience. But, just avoid this.
- Don’t use “fake” buttons or “non-clickable” items on a graphic. (learn more, click here).
- Don’t use heavy use of emojis in ad headline and primary text copy.
- Don’t use strong, outrageous, claims, especially within a certain time frame (This product will achieve x result in 30 days or less!).
- Don’t include timelines with your results.
- Don’t use a “you” statement, or implied you statement like “how to”
- Don’t use the word “you” (Are YOU struggling with XYZ?)
- Don’t use excessive imagery of skin, bathing suits, low cut tops, etc.
- Don’t use disruptive ad creatives like flashing lights or rapidly changing bright colors (will this cause a seizure?)
- Don’t let rejected ads hang out in your account. Delete them. The higher your rejected to approved ratio, the worse it is for your account.
- Do use “3rd” person statements (She accomplished XYZ with this product)
- Do use believable User Generated Content.
- Do showcase the product when possible
Basic Facebook Ad Compliance Rules to Ask Yourself
There’s a lot more ad policy that you need to familiarize yourself with, but if you adhere with the guidelines I’ve shared, they will help give you a “step up” against your non-compliant competition. As we already have realized that in Facebook court, we are always guilty until proven innocent.
In summary, it’s important to ask yourself the following questions when making ads.
- Are my ads honest and truthful?
- Are my ads transparent?
- Are my ads highlighting realistic results, without exaggeration?
- Am I misleading people?
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