Getting your ads.txt file up and displaying the correct information is extremely important. The ads.txt file tells the partners spending on your inventory that they are allowed to serve ads on your website.
If the ads.txt file is not detected, there may be some additional steps you need to take in order to continue with your Journey onboarding.
This guide will assist in helping you troubleshoot the ads.txt errors you are seeing so that you can get your ads up and running smoothly.
WordPress users continue with the instructions below.
Non-WordPress users please use this link to the article that will help you troubleshoot
WordPress Users:
If you are getting an error during the authentication of your Ads.txt file, the first step you’ll want to take is click the ‘Troubleshoot’ button as shown below:
This should take you to your WordPress admin dashboard where you will be prompted with a screen similar to the image below. At this point, you’ll want to click on ‘Continue’.
If your ads.txt file was successfully added, you should see a message similar to the screenshot below that your Ads.txt has been updated. Now you can clear out your site’s caching, and then click the ‘Return to Journey’ button.
Once you are back in your Journey dashboard, click Refresh which will prompt a rescan of the Ads.txt file.
If you are still seeing the “Ads.txt is not present…” message
Visit: ‘yourwebsite.com/ads.txt’ to see if the ads.txt file The file will look something like this:
If you cannot see the Ads.txt file, clear your site’s caching again.
After the cache is cleared, try adding ?test=1234 to the end of the ads.txt url
(e.g. ‘yourwebsite.com/ads.txt?test=1234)
If adding ?test=1234 displays your Journey ads.txt file, then the error is related to caching.
Many sites have several layers of caching. Be sure to clear your site’s cache and you’ll also need to clear caching at the CDN/Cloudflare level (if applicable). You should also reach out to your host and have them clear server side caching.
Once caching has been completely cleared, this should resolve the issue. After this, head back to your Journey dashboard to try and use the Refresh button to validate that the Ads.txt file is present.
If you’ve added ?test=1234 and are still not seeing the Journey Ads.txt file
If you’re certain that all site caching has been cleared and yet you’re still not seeing an ads.txt file, then it would be necessary to access your site files and manually insert the ads.txt file.
You can proceed to this help guide to install your ads.txt file manually.
If you can see the Journey Ads.txt File, but are still experiencing the “Ads.txt is not present…” message in the Journey Dashboard
If you’re seeing the ads.txt file, but are still getting the error message, the next step would be to check for any possible security conflicts that may be preventing authentication.
- Reach out to your host to check and see if there are any host-level firewalls set up that block certain bots from crawling the site, and if there are, request that those blocks be removed.
Note: There are many security firewalls/plugins out there, but Sucuri and Cloudflare are two very common ones.
Once your host has confirmed that the blocks are removed, try authenticating again in your Journey Dashboard.
If your host confirmed that you did not have any security/firewall settings preventing the authentication of the ads.txt file; OR if you are still seeing the “Ads.txt is not present …” message after another attempt at reauthentication, please proceed to this help guide to install your ads.txt file manually.
If you see an Ads.txt file but it does not appear to be the Journey Ads.txt file
If your ads.txt file is displaying incorrect ads.txt information, check to see if you are using a separate ads.txt plugin. An example of a Non-Journey ads.txt file is shown below:
Some common plugins for checking for redirects are: Ads.txt manager, Advanced Ads.txt, Ad Inserter. If you are using any ads.txt management plugins, these will need to be disabled and removed. Once you do this, please clear out your site’s cache first, then reach out to your host and have them clear your server side cache.
Once you have confirmation from your host that the server-side cache is cleared, head back to your Journey dashboard to try authenticating again. If you still get the error message in your dashboard, please proceed to this help guide to install your ads.txt file manually.
If your Ads.txt file redirects to the homepage
If ‘yourwebsite.com/ads.txt’ is redirecting to the homepage, check your site for a redirection plugin that might be forcing the /ads.txt url to redirect to the homepage. Once you have located this redirect, go ahead and remove that rule. Then clear out any caching plugins you may be using and head back to your dashboard and try to authenticate again. If you still get the error message in your dashboard, please proceed to this help guide to install your ads.txt file manually.
If you still cannot see the Ads.txt file after adding ?test=1234
If you have completely cleared out your cache up to this point, including having your host clear the server cache and your ads.txt file is still not there, it’s possible that your ads.txt file was written to the wrong spot in your site file. You’ll need to get it added to the right directory manually.
Before you proceed, be 100% sure that it is not caching. If caching is not the culprit, please proceed to Step #2.
Step 2: Follow the steps in this guide to install your ads.txt file [How To Manually Install Your Ads.txt File].
I’m Seeing My Journey Ads.txt File But It’s Still Showing Missing in My Portal
Clear out any CDN/Cloudflare caching (if applicable). Also reach out to your host and request for them to clear the server level cache. Once you have cleared caching, head back to your publisher portal and try authenticating again. If clearing all caching was still unsuccessful, then it’s likely that you have some sort of firewall or security blocking our dashboard from picking up this file. Some common security firewalls come from Sucuri and Cloudflare, but this is not a comprehensive list.
Reach out to your host to see if there are any host-level firewalls set up that block certain bots from crawling your site and request that block be removed. If you’ve set this up on your own, be sure that the ads.txt file is exempt from those security settings.
If you can see the correct ads.txt, but going through all of these steps hasn’t fixed things, try to clear your cache again with your host and check for additional security blocks. These are typically the only circumstances that would allow you to see the ads.txt file while the Journey Dashboard cannot.