Add child sites to Ad Manager

This article explains how to add child sites in Google Ad Manager 360 to manage and monetize your inventory, a feature for publishers with the "Manage Inventory" delegation type. It includes instructions for adding and verifying site ownership, moving or deleting child sites, and checking site status. Also find answers to common questions about site availability and subdomains.

On this page:

• Add a child site
• Move sites to a child publisher
• Delete a child site
• Check the status of a site in your sites list
• Add multiple sites by uploading a CSV file
• Request a batch review of your sites
• Frequently asked questions

Add a child site

Before submitting your child publisher's site for approval, please make sure the site's content is high-quality, original, and attracts an audience.

The site should have unique content that's relevant to its visitors and provide a great user experience in line with Ad Manager policies. If your child publishers' sites repeatedly violate our policies, we may need to move beyond action at the individual page or site level, and take action at the account level.

The site also needs to be crawlable by robots.txt. If you have a disallow in robots.txt for all agents or just Google crawlers, the site review will fail. The site status doesn't specify failure to crawl the site.

To add a child site: 

1. Sign in to Google Ad Manager.
2. Click Inventory, then Sites, and then Child sites.
3. Click New child site.
4. In "Site URL," enter your top-level domain without any prefixes, such as example.com.

   Tip: If the site has already been added in Ad Manager, you will be shown a warning that you’ve already added the site. This may disrupt ad serving and require retagging your website.

5. In "Select child publisher," enter the child publisher’s name.
   As you type, a list of child publishers appears.
6. Select the child publisher from the list and click Save and continue.
7. We automatically run a check for site ownership. 
   • If an ads.txt file with your publisher ID is found on the site, you can submit your site for review.
   • If an ads.txt file isn’t found on your site, or your publisher ID is missing, complete the following steps to verify site ownership. 
     Note: You’re not required to pass this automated check in order to submit a site for review.
8. To verify site ownership, you and your child publisher complete one of the following options:

   Option 1: The child publisher updates ads.txt

   1. The child publisher sets up an ads.txt file to verify site ownership.
   2. Under "Child sites," for a child site with the "Requires review" or "Needs attention" approval status, click the site URL.
   3. Under "Check ownership," click Copy and send the copied text to your child publisher so they can add it to the ads.txt file. Note that in some cases, changes to the ads.txt file take a few days to process. If you get an error message that the ads.txt file isn't updated, please resubmit the site for approval.
   4. After the child publisher updates ads.txt, you can click Check for updates to try again. This check is available while the site’s approval status is "Requires review" or "Needs attention."

   Option 2: The child publisher adds a GPT tag to their site

   1. Create a GPT tag using the same format required to tag all inventory delegated through Manage Inventory. Be sure to include both your and the child publisher’s network codes.
   2. Ask your child publisher to place the tag anywhere on the page. The tag can be 1×1 pixel, but it needs to be placed on the live site, not on a test page. The GPT tag must be called immediately upon page load, without requiring additional events to trigger the call.

   Option 3: The child publisher adds an HTML <meta> tag to their site

   The value added in the meta tag is the publisher ID and network code of the MCM parent publisher.

   Either one of the following tags is accepted as proof of ownership:

   • <meta name="google-ad-manager-publisher-id" content="{publisher-id}" />
   • <meta name="google-ad-manager-network-code" content="{network-code}" />
9. When ready, click Request review. 

Move sites to a child publisher

Multiple Customer Management parent publishers can move child publisher sites from Sites you own to Child sites for Privacy & messaging. Sites can also be moved between child publishers.

1. Click Inventory and then Sites.
2. Navigate to the site you want to move to Child sites and then click .
3. Select the child publisher associated with your site.
4. Click Move site to confirm.

Add additional child publisher sites and subsites in Child sites.

Delete a child site

1. Click Inventory, then Sites, and then Child sites.
2. In the row for the child site, click Delete.
3. Click Continue to confirm you want to delete that site.

Check the status of a site in your sites list

1. Click Inventory, then Sites, and then Child sites.
2. In the list of sites, find the child site and check its status.
   Tip: You can enter your own search term to quickly find child sites.

Add multiple sites by uploading a CSV file

Because MCM parent publishers manage many child publishers, parent publishers can bulk upload child sites in CSV format and submit them for review.

To add a child site: 

1. Sign in to Google Ad Manager.
2. Click Inventory, then Sites, and then Child sites.
3. Click Bulk upload child sites.
4. Upload a CSV file containing the site url and child network code.
   Tip: Upload your CSV file with the child site's URL and child network code, separated with a comma. An error message displays if the file is incorrectly formatted.

   Example

   testsite01.com,12345678901

   testsite02.com,12345678902

5. Click Save and continue
6. If the sites are successfully created,  displays next to "Add child sites" and the "Review your sites" panel expands.
   If there is an error,  displays with an error message.
7. Click Review later or Request review.
   • Review later: When you click Review later, you'll need to submit the sites individually later. The site(s) status will be "Needs review" and they won't be able to serve ads. You can find these sites under the filter "Requires review."
   • Request review: When you click Request review, you start the review process of your uploaded sites. The site(s) status becomes "Getting ready." You can find these sites under the filter "Getting ready."

Request a batch review of your sites

Once the batch upload is successful, and you click Request review, you can submit multiple sites for review.

If the upload isn’t successful, review your error messages.

Review potential error messages:

Frequently asked questions

Here are some answers to questions you may have about adding child sites in Google Ad Manager 360.

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