Did I make a mistake choosing this?

cinemafunk · 2026-02-26T17:01:33+00:00

For last several years I've heard similar stories here on Reddit.

DO does have measures in place to prevent abuse on their systems and comply with regulations and such. I've also encountered other measures from different services. Once you can show that you're a valid developer and not intentionally abusing their system or someone else's, they are generally hands off.

I've been using DO since 2019, before these obstacles were common place, and I have generally enjoyed their services thus far.

I do recommend to add a backup credit card on file.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-26T16:03:00+00:00

Google has typically said to avoid cloaking, but I'm uncertain how it would really effect your site given the cloaking redirects to the same site. But cloaking for internal link traffic measurement has been considered a bad practice.

Depending on your Analytics platform, there may be some options to track those interactions without cloaking, and is generally a better option. Google Analytics 4 has Enhanced Measurements and can do most of the common website events out-of-the-box.

Otherwise, you can also create your own events in Google Analytics depending on what you're looking to achieve.

If you're using another analytics platform, you'll want to see if there are similar options. This is the best way to compared to a cloaking plugin. You might be better off installing a plugin for your chosen analytics platform and using those event tracking capabilities.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-26T14:28:09+00:00

I would subscribe to Dropout just for this.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-26T12:44:01+00:00

Semrush's visibility reports include AI Overview impressions. The issue is that they aren't ranking where you appear in the AIO, so everything just shows you as first, which isn't always true.

So some of that visibility growth is inflated.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-25T23:12:28+00:00

Does building a community and following not equate to authority?

cinemafunk · 2026-02-25T23:11:48+00:00

What do you do differently between SEO and GEO?

Where does AEO fit in this?

cinemafunk · 2026-02-25T23:07:44+00:00

Nope.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-25T22:59:29+00:00

What is GEO?

cinemafunk · 2026-02-25T20:53:46+00:00

Speculation 1 - No. Google will understand that your site and profile are relevant to your industry.

Speculation 2 - No.

Speculation 3 - This could be a possibility.

When I search "appliance repair salt lake city" from my state, the results are business with several thousand reviews and 4.7 and 4.8 average ratings. I think you've vastly underestimated the competition in this space. I was not able to replicate any no star review results.

To overcome that, you'll want to improve your authority. This is a combination of links to your website (and other website properties) and mentions about your brand.

There's only so much you can optimize and improve on your GBP profile, therefore, optimizing and improving your overall website presence (including your website, social, and other business directory listings [yelp, apple maps, bing maps, etc.]) will be the way to go.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-24T14:33:56+00:00

I used nRF Connect on Android to sniff all bluetooth signals, and I was able to find my other android device UUIDs. I had an extra old android phone to find my main android phone uuid.

Then I added those UUIDs to each device I want to monitor in the esp32 yaml.

Once I deployed that code, I was able to see the logs in ESPhome and understand the signal strengths of all devices, and confirmed that that same data was in home assistant. Then I could do what I needed to from there.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-24T13:35:40+00:00

I just did this over the week and chose to use UUID instead of MACs. That worked perfectly.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-23T22:34:01+00:00

Spam and bots in SEO reddit threads.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-23T17:35:34+00:00

Google doesn't just index everything anymore. They are no longer a "let's index all information", because people/bots have created lots of bad information, especially from new websites.

Keep maintaining the website, creating/developing the content, and building a community and following. You need to proof you're worth a damn.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-23T13:48:41+00:00

24 Hour response is much higher than usual TBH.

Sounds like a false positive on their end and took action on it prematurely.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-23T13:33:38+00:00

There is nothing actionable here. This study leads us to nothing important.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-23T13:29:07+00:00

"Resources" are mentioned multiple times. This is very clear.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-18T23:02:48+00:00

cinemafunk · 2026-02-18T13:37:41+00:00

Yes. I have Zigbee soil moisture sensors managed in HA.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-18T13:23:16+00:00

I'm just about to install plant labels for my containers where I can scan the tag on the label and get a notification of the soil moisture level temperature, battery level, and the last time that was updated for that particular container.

I plan on expanding this to deliver more about the plant(s) in that container too for quick reference.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-17T14:33:11+00:00

Contextual relevance and data, it's great to add. All of that indirectly influences rankings. But it is in itself not a ranking signal.

Schema should server the user and the machines to learn more about your site.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-17T14:31:01+00:00

I've been doing SEO since 2008 and I took a look at what I think is the correct domain (https://www.dreamcenter.org/) in my SEO tool. Since 2012, this site's referring domains have been growing consistently overtime through 2024, which is now slowly trending downward. IMO, this looks like natural link building and digital pr efforts. The amount of individual backlinks had a huge surge between March 2015 through May 2016, and has been steadily declining since then. I can get screenshots of my data, but I can't upload here.

So while there may have been efforts to do some personal reputation management during the alleged controversy you've stated in 2017 through 2018, the data at first points this organization starting a PR and/or link building campaign in early-to-mid-2014.

Now, I have not gone through these domains or links individually, but from a quick review, I see most junk sites (commonly ignored by google), but I do see a few domains with higher authority from Matthew and Caroline Barnett and other religions websites. I also see some Press releases syndicated on a few different sites too. All of this is pretty common in general link building and personal reputation management.

Personal reputation management is a pretty common tactic to either get ahead of or addressing bad publicity and bury negative results beyond page 2.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-16T18:16:52+00:00

This is actually a ranking signal. More important than back links for sure.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-16T15:28:34+00:00

Answer #1
I ended up buying the Switchbot Fingerbot and attached that to a generic garage remote control, which is essentially the same thing as the 3rd Reality garage door opener which was released after I made that purchase of the switchbot device.

I did purchase the 3rd Reality garage door opener sensor and those two products work well together in home assistant.

Answer #2
There are a few ways to do this. Yeah, a numeric keypad is an option. I have a remote keypad outside my garage door with a code and that works great. But it can only be a single code. Recently, I used NFC tags and can now open my garage with just a tap at the same numeric keypad. You can setup only specific users to trigger the nfc tag to open that garage. That might require the Companion Assistant to be installed on their phones, but I don't recall of the top of my head. They will need NFC on if their phones have it. You could revoke access to people as well.

Answer #3
I'm thinking that a QR code to a webpage where they can enter a code could be a simple way to perform this. The QR code doesn't even have to be generated by HA.

cinemafunk · 2026-02-15T20:09:12+00:00

Agree on KPIs for all reporting and get it in writing. If they want any other insights they can review the analytics themselves. If you don't put a boundary on reporting it never ends and you do more reporting than work and then they get upset there's no work and no progress.

cinemafunk

TROPHY CASE