What is triggering Google account suspensions?

[Einstein-Industries]

Over the past 24 hours many of our clients have had their Google accounts suspended. The explanation has been:

"After reviewing your profile, we determined that it has been used to impersonate another individual or mislead other users. This violates the Google+ User Content and Conduct Policy."

We are NOT impersonating our clients, we have their permission.  We are not misleading anyone, simply setting up profiles for our clients on Google+.

This has not affected all of our clients, but a significant number of them.  We cannot find a common variable between the clients that have been suspended, and those who have not.

• Some have had other Google+ profiles in the past, in another account, some have not.
• Some have been previously verified via SMS, others by phone.
• Some have posts in their profile, others have only the profile info filled out.

Again, we are not trying to game Google, we are simply setting up authorship for them, with their permission.

I have not seen much in the SEO community about this today, and this is NOT related to fake reviews.  We do not partake in that kind of activity.

We have written a post on the topic, and no matter how this shakes out, I think our take is solid.  Authorship is changing the game, content is changing the game, trust is changing the game… and Google is getting serious about it.

We have also seen this happen to our clients, to our competitors' clients, and to other marketing firms' clients, outside of our vertical.

Does anyone know more about the topic, especially in regards to the suspensions over the past 24 hours?

[MashBonigala]

Hi, Even though you are setting up accounts for your clients, creating too many from the same IP would trigger the suspension. This is nothing new. I remember hearing about this last year. Mash

[Einstein-Industries]

Thanks for your response.  I know they can track IPs, but this appears to be something different.  It hit our clients, and our competitors clients, on the same day.

I am thinking they targeted our vertical for some reason.

Also, many but not all accounts were affected.

Smells like there's more to this story than just "IP volume tracking", since we deal with that and similar volume issues often (like using the same ph# repeatedly for verification).

[greenhornet77]

Boy the thought has crossed my mind that the number for verification might get tagged. Going to have to start creating Skype accounts or something?

[DanielFreedman]

FWIW, I try to have my clients set up their own Google+ accounts, then share the login and password with me.

This is generally done during one of my update calls or web meetings, with me talking them through the process

[Einstein-Industries]

Thanks for your feedback Daniel. We've tried this before, but with our volume + limited access to the actual business owners, its very difficult. Again, I don't believe this is a IP issue. The same thing happened to competing company's clients in our vertical that are smaller than ours (including some individual consultants that wouldn't trip an IP filter), within the same 48 hour period.

[Andy.Drinkwater]

I am completely with Daniel here - IP's can trigger this. I know you say you don't think this is IP related, but there are many other instances of this happening. Why Google might favour some over others is anyones guess, but this is where I would place my bets.

[DanielFreedman]

Another point. It doesn't have to be the business owner who does the verification and uses his own IP address. It can be the receptionist or anyone else. All I need is for the business owner to tell the employee to expect my call and follow my instructions. On one occasion, the employee even called me from home because she had no web access at work.