Invalid Characters or Punctuation in Keyword, Creative, or URL

Sometimes you may experience errors when trying to push new objects to the publisher, that suggests that there is an invalid character or punctuation within the keyword text, creative, or URL. Please search for this exact error within our Help section first to see if a more detailed article is available that explains the issue and how to correct it.

How To Fix The Issue

If you have reviewed the relevant help center articles and are still unable to find any invalid characters/punctuation, please do the following to reveal if there is a hidden carriage return or special hidden character that is not visible in the platform or seen in Excel:

  1. Open Microsoft Word.
  2. Paste the keyword text, creative (Headline/Desc Line1/Desc Line2), or URL in question onto a document.
  3. Click the Show/Hide Paragraph icon.
  4. Any hidden formatting will be marked with a circle (in which a regular space will be marked with a dot).

Once you are able to identify the invalid character, you can then remove it. To see if this is true, use the Show/Hide paragraph tool in Microsoft Word to reveal any hidden formatting.

Important Notes

  • Please note that pushing ads with invalid characters may result in Google editing the ad themselves. In this case, the original ad will enter the Editing status and a new ad will be created. We would suggest then deleting the ad in the Editing status.

Written by Marketing @ Marin Software

Last published at: June 28th, 2023