Ad Guidelines

Last updated: November 4, 2026

These Ad Guidelines ("Guidelines") apply to every ad placed on ToolFlock. They are part of our Terms of Service; our Privacy Policy explains what we do with the details you submit. By submitting an ad you confirm that you have read and accept all three.

Summary
Who can advertise
What an ad looks like
Where ads appear and how they are ordered
Payments, minimums and floors
Allowed products
Prohibited products and content
Products that need extra review
Title and description rules
Landing page requirements
Review, rejection and removal
Refunds
No guarantees
Links, labels and SEO
Data and reporting
Disputes
Changes to these Guidelines
Contact

1. Summary

Ads are self-serve. You choose one category and up to 3 of its tags, write a title and a description, and pay. There is nothing to negotiate and no one to contact.
Ads are clearly marked AD. They never count toward the ranking, never show a rank number and never take a ranked tool's place.
Ads are ordered by the total you paid in the last 30 days. Each payment counts for exactly 30 days and then expires. You can add more at any time.
Every ad is reviewed before it runs, usually within a few hours. Payments are non-refundable; if we reject your ad in review, that payment is refunded in full.
We guarantee that an accepted ad is shown according to these rules. We do not guarantee clicks, traffic, sign-ups, sales or search-engine results.

2. Who can advertise

2.1. You must be at least 18 years old and able to enter a binding contract, either for yourself or for the business you represent. If you advertise for a business, you confirm you are authorised to act for it.

2.2. You may only advertise a product, website or service that you own or are authorised to promote. Agencies and resellers must be able to show that authorisation on request.

2.3. You must give a working email address. We use it for review decisions, receipts and notices about your ad.

2.4. We may refuse advertisers who have broken these Guidelines before, who appear on applicable sanctions lists, or whose ads we cannot lawfully show.

3. What an ad looks like

3.1. An ad shows only two pieces of text: a title (up to 40 characters) and a description (up to 90 characters), plus the AD label. No logo, image, video, animation or extra link is shown.

3.2. The whole ad is one link to the website you submit. There is no ToolFlock page in between.

3.3. On narrow screens the title and description may wrap onto more lines. We do not edit your text, except to remove characters that cannot be displayed.

4. Where ads appear and how they are ordered

4.1. Pools. Each ad competes in several lists at once:

the home page (all ads);
the category page you chose (exactly one category);
each tag page you chose (up to 3 tags of that category).

Ads never appear on tool detail pages, the Advertise page (it shows example screenshots only) or these legal pages.

4.2. Score. In every list your score is the sum of your payments made in the last 30 days. A payment stops counting exactly 30 days after it was made. With no payment in the last 30 days, the ad is not shown. If two ads have the same score, the one whose oldest still-counting payment was made earlier goes first.

4.3. Top spot. The highest score in a list gets the single top spot above that list, on its first page only.

4.4. Ad rows. The other ads show inside the list in groups of 5 ads in a row. Every list page holds 3 groups (15 ads). On the first page, ads #2–#16 of that list show; on the second page, #17–#31; and so on. The groups sit at fixed places on each page (after the 5th, 8th and 20th ranked tool). On a page with fewer tools, a group sits after the last tool.

4.5. Overflow. When a list has more ads than its pages hold, all the remaining ads are shown, in order, after the last tool of the last page.

4.6. Your position changes. Your place depends on what everyone else pays, and on your own payments expiring. The position shown in the form is your place at the moment you look, based on current payments only. It is not a forecast or a promise. We do not move ads by hand.

4.7. Ranking is separate. Paying for an ad never changes where any tool is ranked, what we write about it, or whether it is listed. See How We Rank.

5. Payments, minimums and floors

5.1. Minimum payment. Every payment, for a new ad or to add to an existing one, is at least $50.

5.2. Capacity. A category or tag list holds 1 top spot plus 15 ads per list page. A list with up to 50 tools has 1 page (16 ads); 51–100 tools, 2 pages (31 ads); and so on.

5.3. Floor for full lists. When a category or tag list already has as many active ads as its capacity, a new ad choosing that category or tag needs a 30-day total of at least the score of the last ad within capacity plus $10. The form shows this as "This tag needs at least $X" and does not accept a lower amount. The home page has no floor.

5.4. No one is pushed out. Ads already running are never removed to make room. When their payments expire, they fall back down the list or into overflow like any other ad.

5.5. Adding more. You can add any amount of $50 or more to a running ad at any time. Each payment counts for its own 30 days.

5.6. Prices are in US dollars. Taxes, fees and currency conversion charged by your payment provider are your responsibility unless the checkout says otherwise.

6. Allowed products

We accept ads for lawful, digital-first products that a visitor can use right after signing up or buying, and that fit the categories shown on ToolFlock:

SaaS and AI products: web apps, desktop and mobile apps, browser extensions, plugins, APIs and developer tools;
digital goods: templates, plugins, add-ons and similar downloads you made or are licensed to sell;
online courses and learning platforms connected to these categories.

The ad must match the category and tags you chose. An ad for an image editor placed under "AI Search Engines" will be rejected or moved.

7. Prohibited products and content

Payments for ads are handled by our payment provider, so we follow the same limits it sets for the businesses it serves. We do not accept ads that offer, promote or link to any of the following:

Adult and intimate content, real or AI-generated: explicit or suggestive material, NSFW chatbots or image tools, webcam or escort-style services, sex products.
Manual services sold online: custom design, development, coaching, freelancing or consulting where most of the value is human work.
Products with little or unclear value: thin AI-generated PDFs, heavily marked-up templates, unfinished sites, and pre-launch pages such as waitlists, teasers or "coming soon".
Physical goods and in-person services, including merchandise bundled with digital products, hardware and supplements.
Illegal or age-restricted products: drugs, alcohol, tobacco, vapes, prescription medicines, or anything unlawful where it is shown.
Financial products, services and advice: investment strategies, wealth-building courses, trading, lending, banking, escrow, stored value or managing funds (payroll included), tax calculators, and any unlicensed financial tool.
Company registration and official filings: incorporation, licences, permits and other government or statutory registrations.
Tax evasion and regulatory arbitrage: shell entities, hidden ownership or "gray market" setups.
Licensed professional services: legal, accounting, medical, tax or financial planning, and other expertise that needs a licence.
Travel, immigration and visa services: flight, cruise or charter bookings, timeshares, visa or citizenship services.
Health and wellness products: diagnostics, weight-loss programmes, supplements, biohacking kits.
Miracle or unverifiable claims: "cures", "reverses aging", "make money while you sleep", guaranteed income and similar promises.
Social matching: dating and matchmaking, random video or chat matching, AI relationship or companion apps.
Religious, spiritual or astrology services: spiritual guidance, paid prayers or rituals, faith-based counselling, horoscopes and astrology readings.
Gambling and games of chance: casinos, betting, lotteries, sweepstakes, cash fantasy sports, loot boxes or spins.
Games and virtual goods: online and video games, in-game currencies or items, boosters, private servers.
Crypto and virtual assets: tokens, exchanges, wallets, NFTs, DeFi and token launches.
Piracy and IP violations: pirated software, books or media, copy-paste code packs, unauthorised downloaders.
IPTV and streaming access: IPTV subscriptions, reseller panels, tools that unlock third-party streams.
Software resale: discounted licence resale, or reselling AI APIs, datasets or tools without clear rights.
Privacy violations and surveillance: stalkerware, keyloggers, tracking people without consent, facial recognition, face-swap tools, scraping personal data.
Hosting and infrastructure: VPNs, VPS or dedicated servers, hosting plans, domain registration, cloud compute credits, bandwidth resale.
Telecom services: VoIP, SIM or eSIM, call routing, call or SMS termination.
Spam, mass outreach and scraping: lead scrapers, bulk messaging tools, databases of private information.
Proxy, cloaking and anti-terms tools: anything that helps bypass rate limits, captchas, logins, platform terms or geo-restrictions.
Cheating and manipulation: hacks, mods, bots, fake reviews or engagement, AI "humanizers", and tools that help beat detection, exams or platform restrictions.
Donations and fundraising: tips, charity or NGO drives, crowdfunding, political or religious donations.
Marketplaces and resale models: multi-vendor platforms (stock-media marketplaces, job boards and freelance marketplaces included), selling on behalf of others, gift or benefit cards.
Ticketing and bookings: tickets, reservations, event access, travel or accommodation bookings.
Weapons and violence: weapons, combat training, explosives, self-defence tools, content that glorifies violence or incites harm.
Anything else our payment provider or its partners do not accept, or that poses a clear legal, financial or reputational risk.

We may update this list when our payment provider updates its own. When we are unsure, we decide based on what the product mainly does and how it is marketed.

8. Products that need extra review

These products are not prohibited, but we look more closely and may ask for more detail before approving:

8.1. AI content tools (text, image, video, voice): no impersonation, scraping or deepfakes.

8.2. Marketing and outreach tools: no spam, scraping or fake engagement.

8.3. Resume, hiring and exam tools: no impersonation or cheating features.

8.4. Audio, music and chatbot generators: no voice cloning, NSFW content, IP infringement or fake claims.

8.5. E-books and written publications: guides, playbooks and reports must deliver what the ad describes.

8.6. Productised services: a fixed digital deliverable, the same for every buyer, not custom or consultative work.

8.7. AI claims in any ad: "undetectable", "100% accurate", "human-level" or "replaces your lawyer / doctor / accountant" are not allowed.

9. Title and description rules

9.1. Lengths. Title up to 40 characters; description up to 90 characters. The form counts as you type.

9.2. Accurate. The text must describe the product on the landing page, in plain words. Prices, free plans and trial lengths must match the landing page at the time of review and while the ad runs.

9.3. Clean. No all-caps words except real acronyms, no repeated punctuation ("!!!"), no emoji, no phone numbers, no other URLs or handles, no fake buttons ("Click here ›"), and no text that looks like a ToolFlock rank, rating, badge or review.

9.4. Comparisons. You may name competitors only for honest, provable comparisons. No disparaging claims.

9.5. Language. English, matching the site.

9.6. Rights. You must have the right to use every name and trademark in your text.

10. Landing page requirements

10.1. The link must open a working page over HTTPS, on a domain you own or control, that shows the product in the ad.

10.2. The page must load without forced downloads, pop-ups that block the content, redirects to unrelated sites, cloaking (showing reviewers something different from visitors), or auto-subscribing visitors.

10.3. The page must show who operates the product and how to contact them, and link to a privacy policy. Paid products must show pricing or a clear path to it, and how to cancel.

10.4. The page must be usable on desktop and mobile and must not require visitors to sign up just to see what the product is.

10.5. You may add tracking parameters, but the final page must stay the same as the one we approved. Changing the destination after approval without re-review is a breach of these Guidelines.

11. Review, rejection and removal

11.1. Review before showing. Every new ad, and every change to its text, link, category or tags, is reviewed before it goes live. Review usually takes a few hours. Adding money to an approved, unchanged ad does not need a new review.

11.2. Rejection. If we reject an ad, we tell you why by email. You can fix it and submit again.

11.3. Removal. We may pause or remove a running ad at any time if it, its landing page or the product breaks these Guidelines, the Terms or the law; if it harms visitors (for example security or fraud reports); or if we are required to by law or a payment provider. Where we can, we tell you first and give you a chance to fix it.

11.4. Changes by the advertiser. You may change your text or link by submitting it again; the change is reviewed under 11.1. While it is reviewed, the previous approved version keeps running.

11.5. Repeated breaches can lead to a permanent ban for the advertiser, its domains and its related accounts.

12. Refunds

12.1. Payments are non-refundable, with one exception below.

12.2. Rejected in review: if we reject your ad in review before it runs, because it does not meet these Guidelines, we refund that payment in full.

12.3. No other refunds, including for changes in your position, being outbid, payments expiring, overflow placement, low clicks or results, or stopping your ad early.

12.4. Removed later for a breach (for example, the landing page is changed to prohibited content after approval): that payment is not refunded.

12.5. Chargebacks filed without first contacting us may lead to the ad being removed and the account suspended.

13. No guarantees

13.1. We guarantee only that an accepted ad is shown according to Section 4 while its payments count. We do not guarantee any number of impressions, clicks, visitors, sign-ups, sales or rankings in search engines.

13.2. Site traffic changes over time and between pages. Past traffic is not a promise of future traffic.

14. Links, labels and SEO

14.1. Every ad is marked AD and is visually separate from ranked rows.

14.2. Ad links carry rel="sponsored" and open in a new tab. They pass no search-engine ranking value. Buying an ad is not a way to buy backlinks.

14.3. Ad links may carry ToolFlock UTM parameters (utm_source=toolflock, utm_medium=ad) so you can see the traffic in your own analytics.

15. Data and reporting

15.1. We store the details you submit (website, title, description, category, tags, email and payment records) to run and bill your ad, as described in the Privacy Policy.

15.2. We count ad impressions and clicks in aggregate, without profiling individual visitors.

16. Disputes

16.1. Contact us first at support@toolflock.com with your ad details. We aim to reply within a reasonable time.

16.2. Anything not settled this way is handled under the "Disputes and governing law" section of the Terms.

17. Changes to these Guidelines

17.1. We may update these Guidelines. The date at the top shows the latest version. Material changes to how ads are ordered or priced apply only to payments made after the change; payments already made keep the rules in force when they were made, for their 30 days.

18. Contact

Questions about ads: support@toolflock.com.

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