Youtube Has a Problem: Invalid Traffic

[@curbsidetech]

dang sorry to hear this. Hopefully they can give you some direction on this.

[@AndroidDigest]

Hopefully. But not likely! They have done this to a lot of creators. If you look up "invalid traffic KZbin" on Reddit you'll find a ton of creators that have faced the same thing. Sometimes it resolves in a month. Sometimes it keeps coming back. Sometimes it never resolves

[@SaberShirou]

It really sucks that there's so many things outside of a KZbinr's control that could potentially upend their channel through no fault of their own. Copyrights, invalid traffic etc. Especially when the support KZbin renders is unhelpful at best, non-existent at worst. I hope you are able to find the right help because you do good work on your channel. All the best!

[@AndroidDigest]

Thanks so much! We're getting there. I don't think I'll ever get a full answer on this. I just have to hope that it goes away. And I think it will eventually but I have to weather the storm until then

[@PLANETWATERMELON]

YT (Google) is a such U know what. 3rd biggest company in the world and they gotta screw with the little guy trying to make ends meet and grow a business on their platform. I hope that Louis sees this and helps. He makes videos on all these big companies being shady. Good luck. Time to start a Patreon channel.

[@AndroidDigest]

It may be time. And it's possible he's made videos on this already. This invalid traffic thing has hit a lot of KZbinrs, and again, I really get why. You have to have some type of punishment if people are buying views, the problem is this is hitting a lot of people who aren't buying views. Either this is hitting a lot of false positives, or there's some other third-party companies that are buying views on my channel and I just don't know it. The biggest issue is that I don't even know what videos are causing the problems. So how can I correct anything? If KZbin won't let me know what videos are causing issues? That's one of my biggest frustrations

[@PLANETWATERMELON]

@@AndroidDigest I would think in the Creator Studio app it should show you which videos are getting high amount of new subscribers. I would think it would be one of those videos.

[@GrammyTapDancing]

You’ve been so helpful helping me on devices. So sorry to hear this. KZbin is not the same as it use to be

[@AndroidDigest]

It's okay! I'm hoping it gets resolved soon. For some people it happens automatically in a few weeks. For others, it can take months. I will still get views, must less ad revenue, but I'll figure it out. Thanks for sticking around as long as you have. I remember some of your comments even years ago. When my channel was very bad. So thanks for hanging in there

[@GrammyTapDancing]

@AndroidDigest I feel same as you fighting to continue on KZbin. They need some compition

[@PareRaj-di4op]

That's happening with my channel also, and I think there are two things I noticed on my channel recently: 1st: In one of my video which has 1.5k views, and one day suddenly it made $65 with just 4-5 views- that could be a reason. 2nd: Recently some of my relatives ask me to show my channel to them as I was keeping it secret, so I shared my channel and just two days later it "I got ads limited on videos due invalid traffic" which means I think they (relatives) are just clicking every videos 2-3 seconds and moving other videos doing the same and sometimes clicking the ads, google has policy for it. It's a biggest problem on KZbin. Can't only depend on KZbin, I better start building my website.

[@AndroidDigest]

For sure! Have to spread out what I rely on

[@QuintonjChambers]

Thanks!

[@AndroidDigest]

Thanks for the support, appreciate you

[@QuintonjChambers]

@AndroidDigest I appreciate what you do. Glad to support. Don't let this light affliction stop you! It's only temporary! Keep us posted on when/if this this gets resolved.

[@tpassmedia]

Crazy how it seems a company or individual can just buy ads/views towards a specific video and it hurts the creator. Then KZbin can't give you any information about it...

[@AndroidDigest]

After Rene commented on my Twitter, maybe he saw this video, he seemed to indicate that it was slightly less than buying views. And it was more about the ads and the extra ad clicks sponsors don't want to pay for. But I am sure that if there were bots being sent to a channel, I bet if they did click on an ad, they wouldn't watch it. Or they would watch the whole entire thing at such an extreme rate that the companies wouldn't want to pay. So I'm sure bots affect things in some way. It's either got to be bots, ad blockers, or someone sending bots specifically to click ads. Either way, it's not the creator's fault and we are punished

[@mdik-12]

Hope this gets fixed.

[@AndroidDigest]

Me too! Thanks for the comment

[@Silver01Son]

That sucks

[@AndroidDigest]

Yeah. I'll keep pressing on though and hope for a solution. But very unlikely based on how many creators this has happened to on Reddit

[@Silver01Son]

@@AndroidDigest Oh man, I hope things get better for you guys!

[@Another_Bad_Creation]

Thank you.

[@AndroidDigest]

Thanks for hanging with me!

[@PareRaj-di4op]

Same thing happening to my channel, 50% revenue down. I'm feeling very demotivated to work. It's been a month, so much hard work I have put to making those 395 videos, I hope it get back to normal soon. Has your revenue come back to normal ? Also you can check ad impression on analytics, if it's half the amount compared what you were getting before invalid traffic, then you still have this problem.

[@YouTubeTeacherRemote]

It has changed because advertisers who run ads on KZbin threatened to boycott because of invalid traffic sources. Yt has done a smack down on ad blockers, because advertisers refuse to pay for ad blocked videos, YT has no other way to keep the free platform running without advertisers, so they are making everyone click on the new rules and updates because of it. Best of luck with your channel.

[@AndroidDigest]

Honestly that's probably it right there. I'm guessing some in my audience may use ad blockers. It's the only logical explanation

[@YouTubeTeacherRemote]

@AndroidDigest there's lots of stories about the "crack down" of ad blockers in Google news

[@MistyKathrine]

I've been dealing with it on my channel for 6 months and it's for the most ridiculous reason and it's pretty obvious KZbin flags stuff it shouldn't be but KZbin doesn't care.

[@AndroidDigest]

Exactly. It's infuriating

[@im_dirty_dan8675]

Just came across your channel, gained a new sub man. Sorry to hear this though hope it all gets resolved. KZbin needs to do better.

[@AndroidDigest]

It's looking up the past 3 or 4 days. So hopefully it gets corrected and stays corrected

[@TechticsDaily]

happened to me in july, and still suffering...

[@AndroidDigest]

Yeah it's crazy. It comes out of nowhere

[@AtHomeWithJill]

How do you find if this is happening on the channel?

[@AndroidDigest]

In KZbin studio on the analytics page it is a notification that will pop up. You can check on your phone app but I'd also check to see if the notification pops up at the top of the page on a computer

[@bulldogboy100]

That sucks Zachy, I hope you can sort out the problem

[@AndroidDigest]

The only person on here that will call me Zachy 🤦‍♂️ but we will make it work. 😂😂. Appreciate all your support

[@bulldogboy100]

@@AndroidDigest It's an Australian thing. We always shorten names to end in a Y an O or an A. Zacho and Zacha just don't sound right

[@justthefacelessgirl]

This is weird because I think most people have the same problem including myself..

[@FinancialRoosterHack]

How many videos did you make until you got monetize?

[@JMGENTERPRISES]

Have you tried unchecking the embedding option for your videos? This will prevent other sites from embedding your videos on their site which may help.

[@AndroidDigest]

I've heard it can't help. But I also know that it can hurt video performance as well because there will be a lot of good embedding that won't be allowed. It's been a couple weeks since this video, and I'm making a little bit of headway. I demonetized all of my videos for a day. Then I added monetization back, but I was very careful to not monetize older videos that are only making $0.25 a day anyway. And I made sure not to monetize old accessory videos with products I was recommending from Amazon. So I maybe took 15 videos out of my catalog as far as monetization. And I made a couple videos private that weren't doing anything. I also remembered an old video that I had like 20 ads for because I was a dummy early in my KZbin career. I was a broke kid with not much money, and one of my videos took off and I added a little bit of extra ads. You never know if people were just clicking off trying to avoid them because there were a lot. So just in case, I demonetized to that video too. Now granted, I'm covering a ton of content that my channel is built around. This is by far going to be the best couple weeks of my KZbin existence for the next year. Because of Galaxy Tabs. But I'm seeing a very large uptick this week. So hoping some things are behind me.

[@JMGENTERPRISES]

@@AndroidDigest Good for you! Hope the progress continues. I've had my channel for 10 years. Around 480 videos. Averaging 1.4M views a month. For the past few years, my revenue has stayed around the same. Two weeks ago, I noticed a 40% drop and this morning saw the "invalid traffic" banner in the studio app 😔. For the past couple weeks I did notice a large influx of weird bot comments on a couple of my videos. I reported them as spam to youtube. Probably reported 40-50 comments. I made these videos private in hopes that will fix the issue. They weren't big earners anyway. I really wish youtube would just tell us what videos are the causing the issue but apparently they will not. I'll try doing what you did. I contacted customer support asking how to restrict views from certain countries and they said that is called Geolock and can only be done on channels with copyrighted material. I have a strong feeling some of my videos are the culprit because some show 90% views from India, Nigeria etc. You stated you left amazon product reviews unmonetized. I have a lot of product reviews with Amazon affiliate links. Keep me updated! Fingers crossed for ya 🤞

[@AndroidDigest]

@JMGENTERPRISES so most of my videos are on Samsung tablets, Lenovo tablets, trusted brands. But when it comes to random accessory videos, where I just pick out five random products from Amazon, those are the videos that I demonetized or left demonetized because I don't trust those random companies. I only have three or four of those videos. Not very many. Most of my videos are with trusted companies. But when you're reviewing random products on Amazon, or just shouting out random case companies from who knows where, that's when it's really hard to figure out what videos are causing all these issues. Because it could be any of those videos. I didn't have any signs like you, no weird comments. No particular videos having any issues. So like you said, I wish KZbin would just tell me. But they haven't. So I had to take some minor steps on my own. I can't tell if my channel is just doing better because it's been 2 weeks. Or if it's because I've done something. Or if it's because I'm covering content people really want to see right now. Who knows.

[@JMGENTERPRISES]

@@AndroidDigest Gotcha. Trusted brands sounds like the way to go. I get offers for fun and free products to review from a variety of Amazon sellers. Usually around $300-$1,000 value worth. It's hard to pass up and thought there was no risk for doing reviews and having affiliate links. I've heard this drop in revenue could be caused by invalid traffic that came in before the actual drop in revenue. And the drop in revenue is youtube recuperating the funds from the invalid traffic. And once the funds are returned, your channels revenue will return to where it was. This makes sense and hope it's the case. 🤞

[@cdomenicci]

Hopefully this gets fixed soon

[@AndroidDigest]

For sure, me too

[@rofiromli]

Thank you!

[@AndroidDigest]

thanks for all your support!

[@singleplayersquad1]

Did it stabilize? I am hit by this right now and did absolutely nothing wrong.

[@AndroidDigest]

No. Weeks later and I'm still hit with it. I released 4 videos a week instead of 1 for the last 2 to 3 weeks and I'm still making less money than I did. But getting closer to what I was at. But obviously 4x the work. Almost double the views. Still less money

[@DosDize]

Thank you

[@AndroidDigest]

Thanks for being subscribed to my channel for 3+years. You are amazing!

[@DosDize]

@@AndroidDigest no problem, I really like the honest approach you have when reviewing a product

[@deepakchand8939]

Dont lose hope. You will one day beat android word 🤴. Love for 🇮🇳

[@lexb277]

Did the invalid traffic go away?

[@AndroidDigest]

Hard to say. I demonetized all my videos. For a day. Then put about 90% of them back, but I intentionally held back any older video only making a buck or two that was promoting accessories or anything a company may want to boost. Revenue went slightly up. But then I covered the Galaxy Tabs, and a new Lenovo tablet, released 4x my normal videos and my views went up more than 100k. My income is going up. But it went down significantly before this. So hard to say if it's the traffic or the insane boost from my extra videos and several 1/10 videos in a row

[@lincolnliking]

Wow. Crazy stuff

[@AndroidDigest]

Hoping things get better soon

[@majtechtings]

Hope things even out and you get back to the financial status you were at and beyond. We ain't going nowhere.

[@AndroidDigest]

Thanks for sticking around and watching my content. Seriously, it means a ton. I don't make a ton on KZbin, but it definitely is important to my family and I love doing it, and I want to keep doing it

[@tiagomateiro]

May our Father bless you and your family, brother 👊🏽

[@AndroidDigest]

Thank you, I'm a firm Christian who loves God and my family, I appreciate the comment. I actually prayed hard about this and this month I had a could of extra sponsorships come in. So I'm grateful. I pray things turn around even more on the KZbin side

[@tiagomateiro]

@AndroidDigest @AndroidDigest Our Father Yah is awesome! Like the Word says, focus on him, and everything you need will be added to you! Do yourself a favor and read Psalm 1. May our Father shine his light upon you all 👊🏽

[@edwardmacnab354]

Well they are running ads so ----

[@AndroidDigest]

Yes. They finally resolved this after a couple of months. And they were running ads. Just less ads across the whole channel, or limiting my sponsor stuff.

[@cdomenicci]

😢😢😢 very sad

[@nonajordan2722]

I know nothing about KZbin rules but what you are saying is ridiculous. No one should be allowed buy views for any KZbin channel. I like your reviews a LOT and feel you are one of the best reviewers on KZbin for tech gear. I wish I could help and sending prayers that this works out for you.

[@AndroidDigest]

Thank you so much. Appreciate you!

[@shargood4315]

Super Thanks to you

[@AndroidDigest]

Always appreciate the support

[@creepycornerstoriesofficial]

Did your revenue got back? Because today happened the same thing to me

[@AndroidDigest]

No. My revenue is mostly back but it's only because I nearly doubled my views by releasing 4 videos a week instead of 1. I should have nearly doubled my income, instead it's still slightly less

[@creepycornerstoriesofficial]

@@AndroidDigest yes but the problem is that you can’t contact anyone and you have to pray just your revenue can start grow magically

[@AtHomeWithJill]

KZbin takes 50% of Thanks 😢 get a kofe account for donations ❤

[@AndroidDigest]

Yeah that's a big amount to take for donations

[@yusufkif308]

I love your channel

[@AndroidDigest]

Thank you so much

[@DirkBadenhorst-t8s]

I love your videos I'm really sad at this 😢

[@AndroidDigest]

It's okay. I'm recovering 😂😂

[@aceyliachonky]

Sorry to hear that. But youtube only love MR beast you gets billion views.

[@josephbennett3482]

You're definitely not seeing things with your revenue , KZbin is cutting back on people using the platform as a form of a job which if you ask me i say that i support them by not paying KZbinrs money anymore because the platform was never designed for being a place that people use as employment , Google and KZbin need to shutdown channels that are used for the creator's way of making money instead of having a real full-time job like everyone else.

[@jralphroman]

You sound like a hater!

[@aztattookid13]

It's really inconsiderate to dismiss the hard work and creativity of content creators like that. While KZbin may not have originally been designed as a job platform, it has evolved into a space where people can build careers. Content creators spend hours planning, shooting, editing, and marketing their work to provide entertainment, education, or valuable information to millions of people. That's no less a "real job" than any other profession. Your view undermines the value of creativity and digital entrepreneurship. Many KZbinrs provide jobs for editors, graphic designers, and other freelancers, contributing to the economy in ways that are very real and impactful. Just because it doesn’t fit into a traditional 9-to-5 mold doesn’t make it any less valid.

[@AndroidDigest]

Respectfully, I'm friends with countless creators. KZbin isn't cutting back. Sometimes you make a little less money because of advertisers deciding to cut back, but they haven't cut back. I'm making the same amount of money per advertisement as I was before. The problem is clear, KZbin thinks that someone is funneling people to my videos, either that's a glitch or it's not, but either way, it's causing KZbin to purposely put less ads on my channel. This is not a creator-wide thing where they are giving less money. It's important that people can do this as jobs though. To make a good review it takes a lot of time to edit, and spend time with a product. If no one has KZbin as a job we'd get a bunch of terrible videos 🤣

[@majtechtings]

Wasn't designed as a place for a job, yet has all types of incentives to encourage constant content to make this your job. Stop hating on the outside of a club you're clearly mad you can't get into.

[@davebo9615]

Android Digest has 34 thousand subscribers! The dude is not getting rich off of this. He ain't Flossy Carter dropping a couple grand on Xiaomi folding phones for fun. Another creator Tech KZbinr i know had over 200 K in subscribers, and that barely paid the rent.