Unfortunately the little door on my dishwasher sticks and won’t open 99% of the time so I have no choice but to chuck the pod in the bottom. It sucks, but my dishwasher works well in every other way and my dishes are clean enough so I’m not spending money on a new one until some other part of it breaks.
Mine does that too. I have learned to put smaller things in the front and larger things (like upright plates) at the back and it seems to be working well.
I also put laundry pods in the little compartment even though they say to just toss them into the thing where the clothes go. I do this because
The pre-rinse cycle will just flush out all the detergent before the actual cleaning cycle
The plastic shit that dissolves to release the detergent was getting all over my clothes and fucking shit up doing it the way the package instructs you.
I've been using the soap compartment for years, I only recently just started chucking the packet into the silverware holder because I've heard that might be better (the little compartment might open too late and be less effective). I'm not totally convinced OP was doing a worse job accidentally
The dishwasher we had when I grew up had a broken soap compartment, it wouldn't stay closed so we would just put the soap in it and shut the door, the soap would spill all over the insides, but everything was clean when it was done.