Ichnos · industry survey
Can you advertise scrap metal and recycling?
Yes — in 0 places we have confirmed, out of 0examined. Not on the major platforms: purchase reporting and theft-prevention rules govern who may sell and what must be recorded, which constrains how a yard may advertise for material.
That is a fact about the platform’s category rules, not a finding about any business in it. The audience has not gone anywhere — it simply gathers somewhere the ad platforms do not sell access to. Each of the 0 says so in its own words, on its own page, and we quote the sentence — so the answer is checkable rather than asserted.
- Places found
- Publications, associations, forums and directories where this industry’s own language is actually spoken.
- Confirmed open
- These say in their own words that an outsider may take part. We quote the sentence, so you can judge it rather than take ours.
- You can simply buy
- Advertising, sponsored placement or event presence — a budget and a decision, not an application.
Why the ordinary channels are closed
Most categories are locked out by one of these. Scrap metal and recycling carries one.
Restricted by a regulator, not just a platform
A public body governs what may be claimed, to whom, and with what disclosure. This one does not go away by changing channel — the same rules apply to a trade publication, a conference talk and a mailing. What changes off-platform is that the channel will actually carry the message once it is compliant.
Not ready yet
24 more confirmed-open places before this map is worth selling. We will not put a price on one that would send you somewhere thin — ask us to prioritise it and it moves up the queue.
Questions people in this category actually ask
Answered plainly, including the one where the honest answer is “don’t”.
Why was my scrap metal and recycling ad account banned or rejected?
Almost always for the category rather than for anything specific to your business. The major platforms apply their rules to scrap metal and recycling as a class, so a licensed, compliant operator is refused on the same footing as one that is not. It is a fact about their category rules, not a finding about you — which is also why appealing rarely works: there is nothing about your individual account to reconsider.
Can I get around it with a second account or a different business name?
Do not. This is the advice most readily available elsewhere and it is the advice that ends businesses. Platforms link accounts by payment method, device, IP, business registration and staff logins; a second account discovered is usually a permanent termination of everything connected to it, rather than the suspension you started with. The route out of a category ban is a different channel, not a different login.
Where can scrap metal and recycling advertise instead?
Where the industry already gathers. We have mapped 0 such places — trade publications, associations, professional forums and directories — and 0 of them publish a way in for outside businesses, read off their own pages and quoted. 0 of those sell advertising, sponsored placement or event presence outright, which means a budget and a decision rather than an application.
Is this just a list of websites?
No, and the difference is the whole product. A list of places your audience gathers is a reading list. What makes it a map is the permission column: for each place, whether it publishes a way in, what kind, and the sentence on their own site that says so. Anyone can assemble the list; the reading is the work.
Industries in the same position
Shut out the same way scrap metal and recycling is — same kind of refusal, so the same shape of answer.
How this was assembled
Learn the language
The vocabulary this industry uses among itself — its regulators, licences, statutes and trade bodies. Say them correctly and you are inside the trade.
Find where it is spoken
The publications, associations and forums where that vocabulary actually appears. Not where an audience might be — where its language demonstrably is.
Check the way in
Whether each place accepts anything from outside, read from its own advertising or submissions page and quoted verbatim.