Banned on YouTube for using TubeBuddy: TubeBuddy & VidIQ might lead to YouTube account suspension?

Banned on YouTube for using TubeBuddy: TubeBuddy & VidIQ might lead to YouTube account suspension?

Let me say this from the onset, the jury is still out on whether using the  YouTube tag generator,  TubeBuddy, and a similar YouTube tag to... 7:25 AM

Let me say this from the onset, the jury is still out on whether using the YouTube tag generator, TubeBuddy, and a similar YouTube tag tool, VidIQ, might lead to YouTube account suspension. But my recent experience has led me to suspect that using TubeBuddy can indeed get you banned from YouTube.

Trust me – I have nothing against the guys at TubeBuddy, I believe they have come up with an amazing YouTube tag generator that has saved many YouTube creators like myself hours and effort in searching for and ranking keywords for our videos and content. But, I still suspect that it is because that I was using TubeBuddy that my channels were suspended on YouTube.

The most frustrating part for me though is that I will never know whether I was banned from YouTube because I was using TubeBuddy or for another vague violation of YouTube’s Community Guidelines. YouTube never explained exactly why they suspended my channels – so I might be wrong here…

YouTube account suspension – how it unfolded

I joined YouTube sometime in 2012 and over the years created 10 channels for my varied content. Like every YouTuber out there, I was also eager to grow my channels and subscribers and so searched for solutions.

I used to use YouTube’s own keyword or tag suggestion tool, which they have since discontinued. I did not exactly like the tag generator as it was not 100% perfect.

Sometime around 2014, I began searching for an effective YouTube tage generator and bumped into the VidIQ plugin while searching the Chrome app store. I immediately realised it could help me get good quality keywords. I began using VidIQ as a tag tool until my laptop crashed around mid-2015.

It was sometime before I could get a new laptop and for the life of me, I had forgotten the VidIQ name - so began another search for another YouTube tag generator. That is when I came across videos by leading creators endorsing TubeBuddy as a great tag tool at the end of 2015.

Like I said, I have nothing against the guys at TubeBuddy, the plugin worked great and was just what I needed to grow my channels – and they began to grow because I no longer needed to spend effort searching for high ranking keywords.

Fast forward to May 2017, I got a YouTube Account Notification email from YouTube stating that:

We'd like to inform you that due to repeated or severe violations of our Community Guidelines (https://www.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines) your YouTube account XXXXXXXXX has been suspended.

After review we determined that activity in your account violated our Community Guidelines, which prohibit spam, scams or commercially deceptive content (https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2801973?hl=en).

Please be aware that you are prohibited from accessing, possessing or creating any other YouTube accounts. For more information about account terminations and how our Community Guidelines are enforced, please visit our Help Center at https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2802168?hl=en.

I was shocked because I had never done anything that could be regarded as spamming, scamming, etc. Unfortunately for me, all my channels were placed on suspension within two days. Ultimately, Google suspended my account...

Google account suspended

I searched all over for solutions for my YouTube account recovery and read that you can actually appeal the YouTube account suspension. I did so promptly.

I also manged to recover my Google account.

Unfortunately, without providing exact reasons, YouTube support sent me emails for each of my appeals stating;

Hello,

Thank you for your account suspension appeal. We have decided to keep your account suspended based on our Community Guidelines and Terms of Service. Please visit http://www.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines for more information.

Please do not respond to this email. Replies to this email will not be processed. Please refer to our Help Center for more information.

Sincerely,The YouTube Team

Hard as it was for me -  am passionate about YouTube and making money online, I decided fine there is nothing I can do but perhaps look towards Vimeo – what can a small YouTube creator from South Africa possibly do to take on a giant like Google right?.

Why I suspect using TubeBuddy and VidIQ gets your YouTube channel banned?

Weeks later in June 2017, because my church Pastor knew about my YouTube activities, he asked me if I could open a YouTube channel for our church so that we can share videos of our church choirs singing and sermons.

I agreed and promptly set up the church’s YouTube channel. I also immediately associated the channel with TubeBuddy.

A week before we were due to share anything, we got a YouTube Account Notification again stating that:

We'd like to inform you that due to repeated or severe violations of our Community Guidelines (https://www.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines) your YouTube account XXXXXXXXX has been suspended.

After review we determined that activity in your account violated our Community Guidelines, which prohibit spam, scams or commercially deceptive content (https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2801973?hl=en).

Please be aware that you are prohibited from accessing, possessing or creating any other YouTube accounts. For more information about account terminations and how our Community Guidelines are enforced, please visit our Help Center at https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2802168?hl=en.

Please tell me it’s not a related to TubeBuddy... The channel was empty - not even a single video had been posted at the time that we got this suspension notice.

The only connection that I could make is that it is TubeBuddy related - the only plugin that I added.

Again I might be jumping to conclusions  - for interest’s sake, I have convinced the Pastor to appeal the suspension. 

Will update the article on the outcome of that appeal.

Meanwhile, I Googled online about whether using TubeBuddy or VidIQ can get you banned from YouTube

There are varied views on the subject with one “top YouTuber”, who used to recommend TubeBuddy and VidIQ saying while he has not had problems “all my friends using them have got their Youtube channel suspended for YouTube’sTerms of Service, specifically section 4H which says, 

1. You agree not to use or launch any automated system, including without limitation, "robots," "spiders," or "offline readers," that accesses the Service in a manner that sends more request messages to the YouTube servers in a given period of time than a human can reasonably produce in the same period by using a conventional on-line web browser. Notwithstanding the foregoing, YouTube grants the operators of public search engines permission to use spiders to copy materials from the site for the sole purpose of and solely to the extent necessary for creating publicly available searchable indices of the materials, but not caches or archives of such materials. YouTube reserves the right to revoke these exceptions either generally or in specific cases. You agree not to collect or harvest any personally identifiable information, including account names, from the Service, nor to use the communication systems provided by the Service (e.g., comments, email) for any commercial solicitation purposes. You agree not to solicit, for commercial purposes, any users of the Service with respect to their Content.

 Like me, YouTube is not replying to their appeal.

While some in forums agree that TubeBuddy and VidIQ directly violate the Terms of Service, and are guaranteed to get you terminated, the guys at TubeBuddy maintain their system is YouTube approved and will not get your channel terminated.

Responding to “top YouTuber”, an Andrew Khan assures YouTube Creators; 

It's legal to utilize on YouTube we are even in their recommend Creator Service directory:  https://servicesdirectory.withyoutube.com/directory/tubebuddy. That said looking at that thread on the other forum, he doesn't sapecify how his friends go banned, or what they were doing. 

Phil from TubeBuddy also says:

Hey Gang, Phil from TubeBuddy here (I'm one of the co-creators)

Short Answer: NO, using TubeBuddy or VidIQ will NOT get your channel suspended - you can relax 

Long Answer: First off, you are doing the right thing by researching a product before using it. Browser extensions in particular have more access than standard websites so it's very important to research the credibility of every extension that you use before installing it. 

To calm your fears, please know that we at TubeBuddy work directly with YouTube staff and we are a YouTube Certified Company. You can view our listing on YouTube's official Service Providers website here: https://servicesdirectory.withyoutube.com/directory/tubebuddy

TubeBuddy is used to help optimize your videos for organic growth as well as improve your productivity on YouTube's website ultimately making you more productive and successful on YouTube. At least that's our goal that we work towards every day. By people scaring others away from certified products like ours, especially with falsehoods, you are actually hurting the YouTube community.

We have a strict stance against anything that might be considered even remotely against YouTube's policies. If a user requests something that we feel YouTube wouldn't endorse, it is immediately denied. There is no selling of views, no sub4sub, no automation when it comes to posting comments, sending messages, ect. Nothing "black hat" or even "grey hat" for that matter. Just useful, YouTube approved tools to manage your channel better.

We are used by many top YouTuber creators and YouTube experts every day and they love our product. TubeBuddy has been used by hundreds of thousands of YouTubers over the last 2+ years and has nearly a 5 out of 5 star rating on the chrome store with more than 2,000 reviews. 

You can search long and hard all over the web but the only instance of people getting "banned" for using TubeBuddy or VidIQ will probably be this forum post. As @longzijun said, certain tools we offer could be used for "bad" if put in the wrong hands - but that could be said for almost any product ever. For example, people might use Canned Responses for "spam" which is not good. Canned Responses were added to help speed up replying to your audience when common questions are asked but I suppose yes, someone could go against our policies and use it to spam but that is out of our control and we would stop them from using our product if we found out that's what they were doing. Ready to have your mind blown? GMail itself has Canned Responses. Did you know that? Google allows Canned Responses in GMail because they expect people to use it in a good way and if they don't, they could get punished. 

I think a healthy discussion and analysis of any product is a good thing - especially one that has access to your YouTube channel. So I'm happy to answer any specific questions here or you can email me directly - phil@tubebuddy.com. We work every day to help people just like all of you - we're on your team and will do what it takes to help us all succeed together. 

Like everyone else out there to be handed the short stick by Google, I'm still trying to figure out if and why exactly using TubeBuddy or VidIQ would lead to an account suspension because my feeling is that it is the reason I was banned from YouTube. 

Like I said, an empty YouTube channel was also recently suspended – BEFORE WE EVEN POSTED ANYTHING!!

Again will tell the outcome of our appeal…

If you have also been suspended by YouTube and suspect it's for using TubeBuddy and VidIQ - Please leave a comment below, I want to know if it is the cause...