HoundSignal Capture: the Chrome button

HoundSignal Capture is a small Chrome button for HoundSignal. You are reading a Facebook group or a community page, you see someone asking for the kind of work you do, and you press the button. That one post goes to your Signals page with a score. No copying, no pasting.

Install it. Open the Chrome Web Store, search for HoundSignal Capture, and press Add to Chrome. (Or use the “Get the Chrome button” link under Settings, HoundSignal, Sources.) Pin it to your toolbar so it is easy to reach: press the puzzle piece icon in Chrome, then the pin next to HoundSignal Capture.

Connect it with the one-time code. Press the button in your toolbar and press Connect to HoundBell. HoundBell opens in a new tab. If you have more than one business, pick the one this button is for. Press Connect. A code appears with a Copy button. Press Copy, go back to the button, paste the code in the box, and press Save code. The popup now shows your business name. The code is shown once and is never stored by HoundBell. Lost it? Press Connect again for a new one; the old one stops working.

Press it on a post. Scroll so the post you want is at the top of the screen, or select the post text with your mouse (best when the page shows several posts). Press the button, then press Send this post to HoundSignal. In a couple of seconds the popup shows the score and the band, like “97 Hot, open in HoundSignal”. Press that line and the card opens on your Signals page, where you can copy a reply or add it to leads. If the popup says “Could not read a post here”, select the post text and try again. The button sends up to 30 posts a day; paste the rest on the Signals page.

Disconnect it. Press Disconnect in the popup, or press Disconnect next to HoundSignal Capture under Settings, HoundSignal, Sources. Either one turns the code off. Connect again any time.

What it never does. It never opens pages on its own. It never reads your feed or your groups. It never scrolls, clicks, or replies to anyone. It never runs in the background or on a timer. It only sends the one post you press it on, and it keeps only the post text, the post link, and the display name shown on the post. Signals that find themselves. With Public web on (Settings, HoundSignal, under Sources; it is on from the start), HoundSignal searches the public web every hour for posts near you, Reddit included, with nothing to type. The web check runs during waking hours (6am to 10pm your time; the 6am check catches the night), and if two checks in a row find nothing new it slows to every 2 hours until something shows up. Reddit is free, so it keeps its 15-minute pace around the clock. It builds the searches from your price book and your area, phrased the way neighbors ask: “anyone know a good plumber Danvers”, “recommend house cleaner Burlington”, “water heater near Beverly recommendation”. Up to eight searches, covering your home town and the towns you have been booked in. Half of them look straight inside the places where people ask: community sites like Nextdoor, Reddit, and public Facebook groups for your town, and, if your business works anywhere, the freelance job boards (Contra, Freelancer, PeoplePerHour, Upwork, Guru) where owners post “web designer needed”. It reads public pages only: local forums, Reddit posts in your town’s or state’s subreddit, town sites, and public Facebook group posts that a search engine already lists. HoundSignal never signs in to Facebook and never opens a group; the only ways a Facebook post reaches you are a public search result or the Chrome button (HoundSignal Capture). Directory listings (Yelp, Angi, Thumbtack, HomeAdvisor, Yellow Pages, BBB, Facebook Marketplace) and your own website are skipped. Each result is scored the same way a pasted post is and counts toward your monthly 3,000. The source line shows “Last checked” with the time of the most recent check, web or Reddit; if the search stops answering, the line says so in plain words and the app keeps trying on its usual schedule.

If the web finder shows an error. When the Public web line says Needs attention, the red line under it is the search provider’s own answer, and the grey line under that says what to do in plain words. The usual ones: “403 PERMISSION_DENIED” or “API_KEY_SERVICE_BLOCKED” means the key’s restriction does not include the Custom Search API, or that API is not enabled on the key’s Google Cloud project. “400” with “invalid” means the search engine ID is wrong. “429” or “RESOURCE_EXHAUSTED” means the free 100 searches a day ran out and billing is not enabled on the project. “403” with “billing” means enable billing on the project. A Reddit “403” means Reddit is blocking anonymous calls and the app needs its Reddit app id and secret set. The app keeps trying every hour on its own; once the fix is in, press Test the web search now on the same card. It runs one real search on the web provider and one on Reddit and prints “OK, 7 results” or the exact error for each, so you know right away instead of waiting for the next check. It counts as one paid search and you get five tests a day.

Hands-free leads. The switch Add hot signals to leads on their own (Settings, HoundSignal, on from the start) means a hot signal does not wait for you. The moment it lands, HoundSignal writes the reply, makes the lead with the post and the reply as the first note, and the alert says “Added as a lead. Reply is ready.” Tap the alert and the client card opens with the reply in the note; the Signals card shows the reply too. Your Daily Brief lists it as “added” instead of a score. You still paste the reply yourself. Nothing is ever posted for you. Turn the switch off and hot signals wait for the Add to leads button like before.