Was doing great until Google banned my ppc campaign "OTF Knife"

[lovefishin]

I hope this is the right forum, Im still a noob.

Hi all. I was enjoying a steady increase of sales on my shopify website. I sell OTF (out the front) automatic knives of my own brand that I manufacture in China. heres my sales

I get zero organic traffic. it has been impossible to rank in category of knives. The only way I got traffic is with ppc campaign which was ok because it was converting great and the margins are really high.

but you can see my last sale was april 18th. that is when google cancelled my campaign because of some stupid new rule about advertising "weapons"......

now I am stuck with about 20k in inventory just collecting dust.

I have sold some of my folders on AMazon but they dont allow the automatic knives. I sold $4,000 but my cost of advertising almost equal my sales so after manufacturing cost I loose a little bit of money.

I have invested way too much time and money to give up... I am reaching out to the community for help. I'm almost desperate as my wife sees this as total failure now... I dont know what to do.

 

[lovefishin]

? anyone there?

 

[tomcatplayer]

you could go the social media route and buy shoutouts from various niches like survival, hunting/fishing stuff like that.

maybe directly but some ad space on sites that you think would have potential buyers.

 

[lukec2000]

Yeah, I agree. Create a page relevant to your niche or buy one and grow it.

If not......

Buy an expired domain, create a blog and learn/buy SEO.
Check out Flippa, buy an already working blog and grow it.

Few ideas for you

 

[1Enigma]

Did you use the word knife?

 

[tomcatplayer]

Did you use the word knife?

maybe he should switch to saying “hard and pointy stabbing thingy”

 

[Mr.Sinatra]

Does facebook not allow this type of products as well ?
I think Google did not allow weapon advertising since a long time.

I have no idea how Google adwords works.
If it's all automated as I expect from Google, create another store, new domain name. hosting and anything else that can lead to you.

Repeat the above steps until you get rid of your inventory.
"Do not do this with you main account, as if you loose that one the battle with google will never end"

To me personally if I know that adwords targeting works better than anything else.
Instead of going to look for other methods, stick to the one that is working and grind until you get rid of your knifes.

 

[ppcads]

Actually this knives & guns policy is ~4 years old (if not even more). Its bad idea to build business depending on Google Ads cause it is very unstable. If you still want to use it then u need to find same niche keywords and ads to promote to bypass their system. But i´m sure u wont get same conversion rates.

 

[1Enigma]

maybe he should switch to saying “hard and pointy stabbing thingy”

Stabbing would get flagging in 1Sec

Actually this knives & guns policy is ~4 years old (if not even more). Its bad idea to build business depending on Google Ads cause it is very unstable. If you still want to use it then u need to find same niche keywords and ads to promote to bypass their system. But i´m sure u wont get same conversion rates.

There’s ways around that it’s all in the wording.
Find a Tactical Site that sells the product and study how they word stuff.
Test Banner Ads.

 

[lovefishin]

Thanks guys.... appreciate all the advice and I will look into the shoutouts. i will create a fresh account and play with the wording.

 

[1Enigma]

Thanks guys.... appreciate all the advice and I will look into the shoutouts. i will create a fresh account and play with the wording.

You slipped The the cracks I surprised you didn’t get banned within 5-minutes. Looks like you got Snitched On.

 

[tomcatplayer]

careful brother you’re showing your url

 

[Dresden]

@lovefishin

Might be a good idea to remove your URL from that image.

 

[lovefishin]

careful brother you’re showing your url

@lovefishin

Might be a good idea to remove your URL from that image.

sorry guys.

 

[jul3s]

There is no need to give up, and yes, Google had this rule for a few years now. You are lucky you actually slipped through

As other already mentioned, Instagram shoutouts are perfect for this.

You should also research your niche and do some media buy at related websites/blogs.

Another idea is to create a giveaway on FB and connect to messenger bot and sell through the messenger marketing channel.

Good luck!

 

[klassomm]

Thanks for the advice

 

[Virgirl]

How did they do that? Pardon me for asking

 

[dotc0m]

It's just the nature of the niche.

I ran into similar problems when I was vending firearm accessories. So many regulations from advertisers. Certain wording cannot be used in context and such.

I left the niche because of its complexity. Only reliable form of traffic was from SEO ranking.

I would advise you to move from PPC and into social media start an authority page. Knife laws in America are crazy.

 

[Dresden]

sorry guys.

Nothing to be sorry about. It's just for the safety of your site and niche

 

[NormanJohnson]

I had a highly succesful business with adwords years ago, one day google changed the rules and my account was banned. I hate being at the mercy of these platforms.