To ensure your Ads.txt file is installed in the right location, the easiest thing to do is reach out to your host for assistance with this. If for some reason they are unable to help you, ask them to send you your FTP credentials and then proceed with the steps below.
In order to install your ads.txt file manually, you'll need access to your site's root directory via cPanel or FTP of your web host. Since you are installing this file manually it will need to be updated periodically, so anytime you see your Ads.txt health check is yellow or red, you should follow these same instructions.
Step 1: Download the latest version of your ads.txt file as shown in the screenshot.
Here’s what you may see during onboarding:
Here’s what you may see if you’ve been with Journey for some time:
Step 2: Using an FTP client (ex: Filezilla) or cPanel (in your hosting account), connect to your web host.
Once you are connected, you will navigate to the root directory of your site.
**NOTE: This will be the same directory as your robots.txt file.
In most cases, this folder is usually called public_html or www.
Click into the directory. Once you are there, upload the ads.txt file that you downloaded into this directory of your website. Clear any active cache on your website. Next, visit your website (https://yourdomain.com/ads.txt) to ensure the file is uploaded successfully. It should look similar to the screenshot below (subject to change).
Head back to your Journey dashboard.
Here’s what you may see during onboarding: Click the button shown to continue with the process:
Here’s what you may see if you’ve been with Journey for some time: Go ahead and click the refresh arrow next to troubleshoot:
Proceed to the next steps.
Here’s what you may see during onboarding: If you get an error that your Ads.txt file cannot be found after clicking the “I’ve added the ads.txt file” button, proceed below for troubleshooting.
Here’s what you may see if you’ve been with Journey for some time: If the red error message is still here after clicking the refresh arrow icon, proceed below for further troubleshooting.
Troubleshooting Your Ads.txt File if the dashboard still says it is missing
Step 1: First check to see if your ads.txt is missing by going to https://yourwebsite.com/ads.txt
- If you see your Mediavine ads.txt file there, please clear out CDN or server level cache with your host.
- If you are NOT seeing the file, add ?test=1234 to the end of the url (e.g. https://yourwebsite.com/ads.txt)
- If you do see your Mediavine ads.txt file after doing this, there is still caching going on so keep trying to clear the cache. Your host should be able to assist with this if you aren’t sure how to do this.
- If you are not seeing the ads.txt file after adding ?test=1234, then proceed to step 2.
Step 2: Not seeing your Mediavine ads.txt or you get a 404 page, chances are that you may have saved it to wrong directory. In this case, you’ll want to reach out to your host to ensure this gets saved to the correct directory.
Step 3: Once your host has added the file to the correct directory, have them clear out your server cache. After this, you’ll want to head back to your dashboard and click the button that says ‘I Have Installed My Ads.txt’. Or if you’ve been with Journey for some time, you will want to try clicking the refresh arrow icon again. Both screenshots are below for reference:
Here’s what you may see during onboarding:
Here’s what you may see if you’ve been with Journey for some time:
If you get a green message indicating that your ads.txt file has been found, you should be good to proceed to the next steps. If you get the red ‘missing ads.txt’ message again, but you are seeing the ads.txt file in the right spot, try clearing your site’s cache again with your host. This is typically the only issue that would cause this to happen at this point.