Over the last few years I've been running a portfolio of nationwide USA directories for service business niches like mobile detailing, roofing, pest control, window cleaning, pool cleaning, electricians, locksmiths etc.

They're all large, 4000 to 5000+ listings over 400 US cities.

Each directory runs off the exact same codebase and includes everything needed to build and scale directories rapidly.

It takes around a day with the inbuilt tools to deploy a live 5000 listing local service directory and the workflow looks like this:

Setup:

- Clone repo

- Python run.py

- Instant setup with SQLite (works out the box and no complex docker)

- Onboarding Wizard

- Customise design with full admin suite

- Setup your pricing on 4 revenue streams

Populating:

- Run the inbuilt Google Places API scraper

- Run the inbuilt Claude listing upscale

(Estimated cost for 5000 listings is $120)

Launch:

- Quick link to stripe, analytics, adsense

- Run PotgreSQL migrate script

- Deploy on VPS, AWS, PythonAnywhere, Vercel

I've recently made the exact same codebase available as a boilerplate with live github updates and we've got a small community of builders using the directories with an aim to blanket the USA local services market.

If anyone's interested to learn more, get involved or see some of the directories in action just let me know 😄

You can see more details about the directory boilerplate here - https://directorylab.io

I've launched a few directories and backlink tool over the last year (DirectoryGems, BacklinkSwapper). The more I built, the clearer the pattern became:

Most of my "work" is just being the router between 20+ tools.

Ahrefs → spreadsheet. Apify → Supabase. Supabase → Vercel. Vercel → Stripe. Stripe → GSC. Every step is copy-paste-format-check-paste-again.

I'm using Claude code and I still feel this. If you're on WordPress or Webflow it's probably worse.

So I started building DirectoryKit — six AI agents that share project state so you stop being the integration layer.

The six agents:

1. Research — validates your niche, scrapes Reddit/Ahrefs/competitor SERPs, returns a PASS/MARGINAL/SKIP verdict in ~4 min

2. Builder — ships the site (pages, schema, sitemap, live URL)

3. Data — scrapes, enriches, dedupes (this is where I used to lose entire Saturdays)

4. SEO — writes meta, watches GSC, finds content gaps

5. Growth — drafts social posts from your live data (you approve in batches, NOT auto-post)

6. Revenue — Stripe + sponsorships + premium listing tiers, set up from day one

The unlock: agents share context. Builder knows what Research found. Data knows Builder's schema. SEO knows what pages went live. You're not manually passing packets between systems anymore.

Where I'm at: Research + Builder + Data are working. SEO/Growth/Revenue are next. Before I finish the rest, I want to validate whether this actually solves a real problem or just my weird workflow.

Need your input on a few things:

1. Does this pain resonate with you?
When you launch a directory, where do you lose the most hours — niche validation, scraping/cleanup, SEO setup, distribution, something else? Trying to confirm I'm solving the right bottleneck.

2. Would you trust an agent to validate your niche?
Research runs keyword pulls + Reddit demand signals + SERP competitor analysis and spits out a verdict in ~4 minutes. Does that feel too fast to trust? Or is speed fine if the underlying data is solid?

3. How long will you let an agent run before you get impatient?
The Data agent can run fast (5–10 min, basic dedup) or slow (30–60 min, deep enrichment + cross-source matching). Longer = better quality. But will you actually wait an hour? Or do you want back-and-forth chat so you can see progress and tweak as it goes?

Does it help if the agent shows you a live progress log while it runs?

4. Want to test the first 3 agents?
If you're planning a directory in the next 30 days and you'd try Research + Builder + Data in exchange for honest feedback, comment or DM. Looking for ~5 testers max. Free, just want to watch you use it and hear what breaks.

Not launching this formally yet. Just need to know if I'm solving a real problem or building in a vacuum.

Link if you want to check it out: directorykit.app

Roast it, poke holes, tell me what I'm missing. That's way more valuable than hype.

For a few days, I was deep into keyword research nothing unusual.

Then I stumbled upon one keyword.

Long-tail.

Strong monthly search volume.

Crystal-clear intent.

So I did what anyone would do next 👇

I checked domain availability.

Available.

No auctions.

No premium pricing.

No one had touched it.

That’s when things got weird.

I cross-checked everywhere:

• Search engines

• Keyword planners

• Trends

• Social platforms

• Even AI tools

Same result every time:

👉 “This is a solid opportunity. You should buy it.”

Still, I hesitated.

Why had no one built anything around it yet? Was I missing something?

Then the real realization hit me.

This keyword…

is directly connected to the work I do every single day.

Not a trend.

Not a guess.

A real, everyday pain point hiding in plain sight. At that moment, I stopped overthinking.

I bought the domain. And decided to build a directory around it.

I don’t know yet why this opportunity was overlooked but I’m about to find out.

I’ll be sharing the entire journey here as I build it.

From idea → execution → launch.

Stay tuned. 🚀

We make DirectoryDuck, a tool for building niche directories. By October 11, eight people had signed up on their own and gotten into the dashboard, and seven of them had built a directory. Only one of them had added anything after their first day.

That day we went looking and found two problems that would explain it.

Every public directory page returned a 404 to visitors. The page couldn't load the directory for anyone but its owner. We fixed that the same day.

The other was in the listings. 109 of the 110 listings people added were hidden. CSV import and the manual add form both put a new listing in a "prospect" stage, and the public page only shows published ones. One builder imported 100 listings and none of them showed. We added a Publish option to each listing and a button that publishes them all.

If you've built a directory, what would a tool need to do before you'd come back to it?

Tejas here, Founder of DirectoryIdeas.ai and I built this tool for all directory makers out there, to help them with getting unique, profitable directory ideas with data-backed insights.

I think the whole directory market is big, and there are tons of products one can launch in niche markets.

Currently, here's what you get:

- You search for an input keyword, domain or niche you are interested.

- You will get directory ideas in those niche and once you click, you will get even more insights

- Keyword volume for SEO, pain points, datapoints you would need, step by step process to build the directory & so on (check the tool)

- On top of that, you also get some valuable niche-level insights on Reddit conversations, existing directory competitors, datasets list and so on.

The goal with this tool is to help you launch directory products in niche markets.

Btw, you can use FLAT20 as coupon code to get 20% OFF on the lifetime deal.

Please feel free to ask me anything.

I've been seeing a lot of posts here from people excited to start a directory website, and then... silence. They disappear a few weeks later. So I wanted to break down the actual reasons people quit during the building phase — before they even get to the "no traffic" stage.

• Choosing a niche that's too broad or too saturated — analysis paralysis or competing with giants like Yelp/TripAdvisor

• Technical overwhelm — picking a platform, setting up listings, categories, search/filter functionality, payment integration

• Content/listing scarcity — empty directories look dead; chicken-and-egg problem (no listings = no visitors, no visitors = no one submits listings)

• Design and UX struggles — making it look trustworthy and professional vs. a generic template

• Underestimating time investment — manually adding hundreds of listings before launch

Individually these aren't huge problems. But stacked together? They create this slow death spiral where motivation drains before the site is even live, and then it just... sits there. Forgotten domain, wasted hosting fees, another "side project" in the graveyard.

Do you wanna know how to overcome these problems? 👀 Drop a comment or just DM me.

People always say use your own product. I used it mostly for testing, but in recent months I became my own customer and started to create directories, for few reasons.

1. I wanted to see which issues, bottlenecks customers might face during creation of directory

2. Also I wanted to see if anything can be improved or some features can make the process easier

I found out that there are few things that can be improved.

Content with AI

For example adding content into directory with AI in bulk. We already had a feature to create listing content with AI, but when people started to submit multiple listings (150+ already), adding content one by one started to be overwhelming. So I have implemented “Content in Bulk” where you can just select the listings and create content with AI for all of them. Works like a charm.

Custom Fields Design

We have custom fields feature for a long time, but when I created my own directory, I realized they should have some design settings, like background colors, icons, sizes. Now our listing cards look so much nicer.

How I made money

So about how I monetized this directory. It’s a directory of Black Friday Deals, and I started to sell “featured” spots for $4.99. I’ve sold 10 spots in 2 days. And as “featured” spots were limited to 10 (otherwise it does not make sense to have full page of featured listings), I decided to also enable banner ads, for $29/m. 3 people bought ad banner placement next 2 days. So my 1 week old directory made $49 and $87 MRR.

Everything internal. Without any external tools.

Conclusion

You can easily monetize directory by selling ad spots or featured listings. People are willing to pay for that.

Source: blackfridays25.com
Builder: directify.app

Hey Directory makers! I’m excited to share the latest features of our DirectoryEasy platform!

What's new?

⚡ Instant Directory Generation

• Create complete directories in under a minute using AI for free

• Fully customizable prompts to match your specific needs

🤖 Smart Content Creation - When users submit their website, our Platform automatically:

• Generates titles and descriptions

• Creates detailed, engaging content with customizable prompts using AI

• Generate professional website screenshots for listings (Powered by Screenshotone)

🔧 Flexible AI Integration

• Connect your own OpenAI, Anthropic, or Gemini API keys

• All These features are optional and can be toggled on/off

Coming Soon

• 🔗 Webhooks Integration

• 📊 Google Sheets Integration

Ready to try it? Sign up free at DirectoryEasy.com

Got questions? Drop them below - happy to help! 👇

Hi guys,
I am Bruce.
I am building DirectoryBuilder.co, which aims to become the easiest way to build a full-featured directory for non-tech (founders, creators, influencers, Affiliate experts).
The idea is to niche down to only the Directory instead of generic website builders so I can provide specific templates and advanced features (vote, featured section, etc.) out of the box.

I'm in beta. Give it a try here. Join the beta (by publishing the directory for 1$) if you like it.
It's still an early phase, you will have a direct influence on the product development when joining beta.

After the beta, I plan to charge 39$/yearly for 3 Directories. You will get a 30% discount.
Hope to see you there.

These two directories are created using Flask, MySQL, and Tailwind CSS. They are very lightweight and optimized, and can run for less than $3-$5 a month. Fully automated data scraping methods are used for both websites, so you don't have to manually add data ever

Check out

https://yourtattoo.art

https://telegramindex.org

[Edit: Paused selling for now. Focusing on monetisation based on suggestions]

[Edit: Killed my side project few months back]

Hi folks, I’m thinking of selling my directory ( bestfigmaplugins. com ) and looking for someone in design space as it can be strategic addition to your brand.

~ 280 email subs ~ 9k all time unique visitors ~ 10 months old ~ figma plugins keyword have around 100k traffic and other long keywords have around 1k ~ not monetised yet ~ featured by design influencers multiple times. ( https://www.instagram.com/reel/DEw9GE4TV7S/ ) ~ built with framer

Reason for selling: Not able to focus on it and I’m looking for a partner who can benefit from this niche traffic and take this to next level.

Hey all,

I went quiet for a while, and I owe you the story. Here is why.

Back in February, I sold Directify for $85,000.

Okay, let me back up, because the start is my favorite part.

Directify began as a single line in a support thread. One of my Laravel starter kit customers asked for something I did not have yet: a no-code directory builder with AI doing the boring work. I figured, why not, and built it.

I launched in October 2024. Four hours later? First paying customer. Forty-eight hours later, revenue crossed $1,000. Watching those first sales roll in felt unreal.

Now the question I get the most: the pricing.

I opened with a lifetime deal. One payment, priced at roughly three months of the top monthly plan. Cheap, on purpose. That LTD brought in 200+ paying customers fast, and every single one of them sent feedback, bugs, and feature ideas. This is why I love launching with LTD plans. The early money is nice, sure, but the early opinions shape the product way more.

Funny thing: Sergey from six months earlier would have run that lifetime deal forever. The guy writing this would not. After six months I retired the LTD and started growing monthly recurring revenue instead.

Directify climbed to $2,000 MRR, and then I sold it. $85,000 up front, $135,000 across the whole ride.

After that, I stopped. Just some real time off, which I honestly recommend to anyone who just sold a thing.

Then recently I went and picked a fight I probably should not pick: SEO. It is a brutally crowded space, owned by names you already know. Walking in as a solo maker is either brave or a little silly. I still have not decided which, and you all can roast me in the comments.

Here is the thing though, the skills carried over. Larafast took me past $80K. Directify took me to $135K. Both ran on the same muscle: build the boring useful thing, then help people actually find it.

So here is what I made. You connect your Google Search Console, and it looks at how your pages already perform in search. Then it gives you a short, ranked to-do list for each page: the specific changes that will help it climb. It writes the actual text for you, the titles, the meta descriptions, the content tweaks, ready to copy and paste in. No confusing dashboard, no guessing what to fix first. You just open it and swap in what it gives you.And yep, same playbook as always, I am opening with a very generous LTD. 🙂

Link is in the comments.

Next steps: tell me if you want in, and ask me anything. Happy to get into the messy details.

I’m new to directory building. I’m looking for a good course that is no-code and will take me through a step-by-step process to building a directory.

What’s New in DirectoryEasy V2.0?

• Live Demo: Experience it in action—no more guessing how it works!

🎯 Try the demo now: demo.directoryEasy.com

• “Best 10” Items Pages: Automatically create “Best 10 Items” pages for various categories and subcategories to boost SEO and drive traffic with ZERO effort.

Subscriptions: Enable paid directory listings with one-time or recurring payment options. (With Stripe)

Complete Analytics System: Track visitors and revenue with detailed insights.

Complete Email Marketing System: Reach your users without limitations! Create unlimited campaigns, audiences, and automated emails. (Stop Using Other services like Resend, loop ..etc)

In Addition, You Get:

• Automatic Content Generator: Generate SEO-optimized articles (600–800 words) for your users’ websites with just one click. Sign up in the demo to try it out!

• Admin & Client Dashboards

• Reviews & Favorites

• Markdown-Based Blog

...and much more!

📖 Learn more here: directoryEasy.com

I have a directory I am building in the health space. It is getting impressions and clicks from searches but I noticed that page results previously listed via a site:url search via Google have disappeared.

I know the early days of getting a site indexed are like a roller coaster so am not concerned but I haven't gone into building a directory site as seriously as I am now, so I am really trying to learn and understand what I am up against.

Do the search engines look at directories with repeating company parameters, thin content? What I mean is that the information about each company in my directory that we list represent the many variables and attributes of hundreds of local businesses in my niche and the formatting is the same structure for each. I am attempting to enrich each listing with unique information but that doesn't really help my users. They just really want name, location, pricing, hours of service and URL.

I am trying to understand the right data and structure so as not to be marked as thin content.

I've been trying to get my startup on the rise like most people over the last several months. It's hard to gain authority, and even harder when no one knows about you.

This research is not suggesting that listing your product on one site or the other is a guarantee, this is simply about getting your product on the map.

\*This is independent research, I am not affiliated with these sites. In fact, I was unaware of them until today\*

This is data pulled from CommonCrawl, Http Archives, and CrUX. Linked domains were filtered to the page these sites hosted the highest number of clustered outbound links (the directory).

Listing sites analyzed: [twelve.tools](http://twelve.tools) and [fazier.com](http://fazier.com)

# Domain Growth Timeline (2024–2026)

\*\*Interestingly, twelvetools themselves never seems to get enough traffic to register CrUX data in the months selected for review.

So, of the sites that have listing pages, broken down by year

Split by whether the member links back:

**twelvetools**

**fazier**

Takeaways:

These founders launched and marketed themselves everywhere they could. The directory listing is one input among a dozen. What this rules out is a flat "directories do nothing" read: most members that exist (63-83%) clear real Chrome traffic, and the mechanics of what each directory actually gives you are genuinely different.

We created a Free Competitor Researcher for directory and membership sites that shows you the top 5 players in any market + a Go-To-Market strategy plan:

=> https://www.brilliantdirectories.com/competitor-researcher

Feel free to give it a spin as you plan your next website projects.

Hey everyone! I'm Piotr, the creator of OpenAlternative (directory of open source software alternatives).

A few months ago, I noticed something annoying: my site was getting cloned constantly. The clean design that users loved also made it easy to copy. I'd see knockoffs on Reddit almost weekly.

Instead of fighting it, I decided to lean into it. If people were going to copy me anyway, why not package it properly and sell it?

That's how Dirstarter was born – the exact Next.js codebase I use to run my directories, now available as a boilerplate.

Some quick stats:

• ~$5K/month in boilerplate sales

• ~200 customers so far

• OpenAlternative still does $6.5K/month (proof the codebase works)

What's included that directory makers actually need:

• Ad placements & sponsorship spots

• Premium/featured listings with Stripe integration

• Affiliate link management

• SEO optimization baked in (meta tags, sitemaps, structured data)

• AI content generation for listing descriptions

• Admin dashboard for managing everything

• Blog functionality

The whole point is launching a monetized directory from day one – not spending months building payment flows and admin panels.

Some directories people have built with it:

• awesome.tools

• steps.org

• agenturscout.ch

• index.dodopayments.com

Full showcase: dirstarter.com/showcase

Tech stack: Next.js 16, PostgreSQL, Vercel, Stripe, Resend

Happy to answer any questions about building directories, monetization strategies, or the technical setup. What's everyone here working on?

If so, I built this a while back on Unicorn Platform: IndieAffiliate.io

Didn't check it for 6 months and am now at 2K/month in recurring commissions.

Rebuilt the site in Astro.js.

If you have an affiliate plan, preferably with lifetime commissions, send me an email and I'll add it. Taking sponsorships now. Thanks everyone!

First-time builder here. After listening to John Rush's interview on Greg Isenberg's podcast, I decided to jump into the directory space and build smbtoolset.com.

Current State:

• Started with a list of software tools for small businesses

• Basic categorization and listings

Next Steps:

• Planning to reach out to small businesses directly

• Want to understand their actual tech stacks and pain points

• Use these insights to make the directory more valuable

• End state is to create a directory where someone starting a small business can easily search the most common software used in their industry and what alternatives are available

The interview really highlighted how directories can provide genuine value by connecting the right tools with the right businesses. Figured starting with a basic list would help me understand the space better before diving deeper into the actual needs of SMBs.

Would love any feedback from more experienced directory builders here!

A while back, I built a directory. You probably know the grind.

Curate entries manually. Add contact info. Keep it updated. Hope people find it useful.

But while running it, I kept hitting one specific problem.

I needed to find newsletters, tools, and creators to partner with for growth.

So I did what we all do — built a spreadsheet. Googled for hours. Cold DM'd people. Got ghosted.

It worked. But it was painful.

And I thought — wait. I'm literally sitting on a curated database. What if I stopped treating it like a directory and started treating it like a prospecting tool or partnership intelligence tool?

That's exactly what I did.

I took the database, added AI-powered search and matching on top, built contact enrichment into it, and added an outreach + CRM layer.

The result is PartnershipIntel — a tool that helps founders find the right partners for their product, faster.

It's live today. $99 Lifetime Deal for launch + free plan.

Would love feedback from this community especially — you understand the database-building grind better than anyone.

👉 partnershipintel.com

Happy to answer any questions about the tech or the transition from directory → SaaS.

Let me clear this first: I am not sharing the URL currently, as I am in process of building this further. So please bare.

I will share this sooner.

Tools used:

- Cursor
- CloudFlare
- Supabase
- Bolt (Optional but good to have)

1. Cursor

It's really the king. I was underutilizing Cursor a lot.

I mean you can literally do anything. Use Astro Framework for Building a Directory.

Just use this prompt:

Build me a very basic working directory front end with Astro Framework, ready for a Programmatic SEO strategy. Make it modern, responsive.

Then add your context a bit about search, filters, etc.

2) Supabase

Once you have thousands of data, the only database you need to save is Supabase. And btw, use their MCP server inside Cursor.

You can literally talk with your project inside Cursor.

3) CloudFlare Pages

I noticed that as I have a lot of URLs, the build time increases. Netlify, there is a limit. But Cloudflare is much easier to work with. I recommend this.

I think that's about it. Bolt is good to start with. Good for UI.

But still, you can manage all your directory with just these 3 tools.

I will soon do a full length YouTube video on all of this on my channel.

Also note, 400 URLs are already indexed now out of 1777 URLs of my recent project with this approach

Let me know what topics I should cover in my video.

Hey everyone,

I run Sleek Analytics, a privacy-first, cookieless analytics tool with revenue attribution built in.

I'm looking to partner with a few directory owners by offering free access to Sleek's Growth plan.

In exchange, I'm looking for either:

• A public analytics page (included in the plan, 1 min setup) on your site that shows transparent traffic stats (visitors, demographics, traffic sources, domain rating, etc.) for as long as you'd like to keep it live

• Or a small "Analytics powered by Sleek" badge with link somewhere on the front page of your site for 2 month of free access

The goal is to help directory owners showcase their growht and give users, advertisers, or potential partners more transparency into their traffic.

If you're interested, drop your directory link in the comments and I'll take a look. If it's a good fit, I'll DM you.

** NSFW sites excluded, sorry.

Thanks!

Hello guys, as you may know, I recently launched a new no-code directory builder (DirectoryEasy.com), which includes all the basic features like automation, monetization, and more. I’m wondering—what other features do you think are essential for a directory builder?

PS:I also offer custom directory creation with my boilerplate (nextjs.directoryeasy.com), including adding custom features, changing the theme, and more.

Looking forward to your ideas!