What happens when an Ad Grants account breaks a rule?
By Jose Gomez, Jr., CEA, MVTAAdapted from Chapter 2 of The Nonprofit Ad Grant Handbook · Checked against Google's rules November 3, 2026Google may simply pause the offending keyword, or, for the CTR rule, temporarily deactivate the account after two consecutive months under 5%. Breaking a rule doesn't always come with a warning. Deactivation for click-through rate isn't permanent. Google reactivates accounts once the cause is fixed and the account meets every requirement.
What Google can do
Suspension without notice. Google says violations can lead to automatic suspension without notice, and repeated violations can cost an organization the grant altogether.
Deactivation for click-through rate. For the CTR rule, two consecutive months under 5% means temporary deactivation.
Paused keywords. For other rules, such as a single-word keyword, Google may simply pause the offending keyword and move on.
When Google pauses a keyword for breaking a rule, it doesn't come back on its own. If nobody notices, a program can go for months without its main keyword.
How you'll find out
You'll usually find out in the account itself. It may be a notification, a banner, ads that stop serving, or a keyword marked as paused by Google.
Read the notice closely, because it tells you which rule was broken. That tells you where in the handbook the fix is.
Fix a broken rule in the month you notice it. A small problem usually takes minutes to correct, while one that has already cost you the grant takes weeks.
If the grant is deactivated
Deactivation for click-through rate isn't permanent. Google reactivates accounts once the cause is fixed and the account meets every requirement, and the order in which you fix things decides how fast that happens.
An illustration from the handbook. The arts council is a composite, not a real organization.
An arts council's grant was deactivated in the spring. It had closed two months in a row below 5%, after a broad "events" campaign drowned the rest of the account in low-click impressions. The council's director ran the rescue, fixed the events campaign, and sent the reactivation request the same week. Nothing happened. Two weeks later, she noticed a notification she'd missed. The annual program survey had been unanswered since winter. Google wasn't going to reactivate an account with an open issue.
The order to work in
Work through the steps in this order.
- Fix click-through rate. Run the CTR rescue until the last 7 active days of enabled keywords show a click-through rate of 5% or more. While the account is deactivated, ads aren't serving, so use the last 7 days on which it was active.
- Fix everything else. Go through the whole monthly checklist, covering single-word and generic keywords, Quality Score 1 and 2, structure, sitelinks, locations, conversions, bidding and website. A request with any open issue is likely to go nowhere.
- Complete the survey if one is outstanding.
- Then request reactivation.
The rescue is in section 10.3 of the handbook, the monthly checklist is in Chapter 9, and section 10.7 describes the reactivation request.
Keep the account's settings intact while it's deactivated. Pausing everything or deleting campaigns doesn't help and makes the evidence harder to show. Fix the problems in place.
Questions
Which days count when we fix CTR while deactivated?
While the account is deactivated, ads aren't serving. Use the last 7 days on which it was active, and keep working until enabled keywords show a click-through rate of 5% or more over those days.
Is deactivation permanent?
Deactivation for click-through rate isn't permanent. Google reactivates accounts once the cause is fixed and the account meets every requirement.
Should we pause all our campaigns while the account is deactivated?
No. Keep the account's settings intact. Pausing everything or deleting campaigns doesn't help and makes the evidence harder to show. Fix the problems in place.
Can we ask for reactivation as soon as CTR is fixed?
Fix everything else first, and complete the survey if one is outstanding. A request with any open issue is likely to go nowhere.
See something wrong or out of date? Tell us
Jose Gomez, Jr., CEA, MVTAJose Gomez, Jr., CEA, MVTA, is the CEO of 3nity. He founded the company in 2001 to serve the people who serve people, after working as Internet Director at a media network. He built a career website that was acquired by Salem Communications in 2004, and created the 3nity Web Presence Platform. Through Nonprofit Marketing Center, a division of 3nity, he and his team help churches and nonprofits of every kind bring resources and awareness to their missions, including by helping them get the most from the Google Ad Grant.