Creating Member Directories With MemberPress

MemberPress directories transform individual member profiles into dynamic, searchable showcases demonstrating your membership community's strength and diversity. It’s a listing tools that automatically organize and displays member Profiles. Directories encourage exploration, networking, and engagement while providing significant value to current members and attracting prospects with social proof.

This document covers the basics of MemberPress Directories and how to use them to build communities on your website.

Observação: The ClubDirectory™ add-on is available to MemberPress Growth and Scale plan members. If you're subscribed to the Launch plan, you can upgrade to the Growth and Scale plan. To upgrade, clique no botão Plano de mudança em seu página da conta.

What Are MemberPress Directories?

MemberPress ClubSuite™ is a member networking and community pack that includes the ClubDirectory™ and ClubCircles™ Complementos.

Member Directories are a feature within the ClubDirectory™ add-on, together with Member Profiles. To use them on your website, you need to install the MemberPress ClubDirectory™ add-on and configure the global Directories settings.

Member Directories are automatically updated collections of member profiles organized by criteria you set. This means that MemberPress directories instantly reflect changes to memberships, new registrations, and profile updates. Hence, your members will always see the most up-to-date information about other members within their shared directory.

Directories serve multiple purposes within your membership ecosystem:

• facilitate networking by helping members find peers with similar interests;
• demonstrating membership value through community showcases;
• providing social proof, encouraging new signups. 

Common directory types include all-member galleries, membership-specific listings, geographic directories, and staff showcases.

The visual presentation and functionality significantly impact effectiveness. Well-designed directories with intuitive navigation encourage exploration and repeated use.

Adding Members to Directories

The automated directory population system maintains itself while displaying relevant members. When new members register, the system evaluates which directories they qualify for based on your criteria. Qualifying profiles appear automatically without manual intervention, helping new members feel immediately included.

Membership changes trigger automatic updates. When members upgrade, they instantly appear in new tier directories while being removed from previous levels. Similarly, expired memberships remove profiles from directories, ensuring only active members appear.

Members must have active profile types to appear in directories, preventing incomplete accounts from cluttering listings. Profile visibility settings further refine appearance, respecting privacy preferences while maintaining useful directories.

Creating MemberPress Directories

MemberPress Directories can be designed using the default (Gutenberg) editor, using directory-specific blocks and other blocks (default, third-party) as needed. 

By default, MemberPress will automatically create the “All Users” directory, which lists all your existing users.

You can create additional directories with specific criteria:

1. Navegue até Dashboard > ClubSuite™ > Directories.

2. Clique em Adicionar novo. 
3. Enter a directory título  (for example, “Pro Member Directory”).
4. On the right-hand panel, you can find the Directory Settings. Here, you can set one or multiple directory limitations. These limitations (filters) will define the type of directory:
   • Filter by Role: limit members for this directory to those with specific user roles (one or more). Enabling this filter will allow you to specify user roles allowed for this directory;
   • Filter by Membership: limit members for this directory to those subscribed to specific memberships (one or more). Enabling this filter will allow you to specify memberships allowed for this directory;
   • Filter by Location: limit members for this directory based on the members’ countries (one or more). MemberPress will use the country users set in their profiles. 

5. Here, you can find additional options:
   • Require Profile Picture: enabling this option will hide all members without a set profile picture;
   • Hide Title: enabling this option will hide the directory title on the frontend.
   • Require Opt-in: when enabled, users won’t be added to the directory automatically when they sign up. Instead, they need to opt-in to be displayed in the directory.
6. Clique em Publicar to save the directory.

This will create a new directory on your website. Your directory URL will be automatically generated. The default directory URL format is https://yourdomain.com/directories/directory-title/.

Creating Membership-Based Communities With ClubDirectory™

As mentioned above, directories can be created for specific communities based on one or more criteria. Most commonly, communities are formed around the memberships to which users subscribe:

1. While editing a directory.
2. Sob o Directory Settings, enable o Filter by Membership opção.

3. Select one or more memberships. This will limit the directory only to users with active subscriptions to the selected memberships.
4. Clique em Publish / Update para salvar as alterações.

By combining this filter with other criteria, you can build more specific communities. For example:

• Combining Membership and Location filters – create a member directory of subscribed members from a particular country or region;
• Combining Membership and Role filters – create a member directory of subscribed members with specific roles (e.g. the most successful members)

Configuring Directory Blocks

MemberPress Directories come with multiple directory-specific blocks. These Directory Blocks can be used only when designing Directories.

The default directory template will be loaded automatically when creating a new directory. The default template contains Directory Users, Directory User Template, Directory Filters, e Directory Pagination blocks. You can configure each directory block, and also add or remove blocks.

Directory Users Block

This is the main directory block used to display member profiles. To configure it, follow these steps:

1. Start editing a diretório em Dashboard > ClubSuite™ > Directories.
2. Clique no botão Directory Users block.
3. Select the default Directory Layout clicando no botão Grid ou o List icon.

4. Next, in the right-hand panel, click the Configurações tab (cog icon).
5. Expandir o User Query Setting panel, and configure the settings:
   • Number of Users: set the number of member profiles shown on each page of the directory;
   • Order By: order members based on the Registration Date, Display Name (alphabetically), and User Login (last login date);
   • Pedido: order as Ascendente ou Descendente list;
   • Columns (for Grid Layout): set the number of columns for the Grid Layout.
6. Optionally, under the Estilos tab, you can modify the colors and spacing used.

7. Save changes by clicking Update / Publish.

Furthermore, the Directory Users Block includes an additional block, the Directory User Template Block, which can be configured separately.

Directory User Template Block (Profile Card)

The Directory User Template Block defines how each individual’s Profile Card appears within the Directory Users Block. This is a group of separate user-specific blocks, where each block displays different member-related information:

1. Directory User Photo: this block displays the user’s profile photo. Available block settings:
   1. Defina o Photo Size;
   2. Ativar Link to Profile to link photo to the full user profile.
2. Directory User Name: this block displays the user’s name. Available block settings:
   1. Defina o Name Format to display full name, only last name, only first name, or username;
   2. Ativar Link to Profile to link the name to the full user profile.
3. Directory Profile Button: this block adds a button linked to the full user profile.
4. Directory User Fields: this block allows you to add any user field data, including your custom fields. Available block settings:
   1. Use o Select Field dropdown to choose which field's data should be displayed in the profile card.
5. Directory Social Icons: this block displays icons for any social media platforms a user added links to in their user profile. Available block settings:
   1. Sob o Layout panel, you can set the icon Justification e Orientation.

Arrange elements with visual hierarchy, apply consistent styling, including backgrounds and hover effects.

When you click on this block, you can modify the member profile card:

1. While editing a Directory, click on any Profile Card within the Directory Users Block.

2. Clique no botão column block within, and the + ícone para add or remove blocks you want to use. 
3. Próximo, configure the settings and styling of each block.
4. Save changes by clicking Update / Publish.

Balance information density with visual clarity. Too much information creates clutter, while too little fails to differentiate members.

Directory Filters Block

Filters help visitors find specific members through interactive refinement options. Add various filter types, including: 

• Location;
• Membership;
• User role;
• Profile Picture;
• Layout.

Furthermore, you can disable Show Search or hide the search box (which is enabled by default). You can also set a custom Search Placeholder.

Directory Pagination Block

Pagination controls navigation through multiple profile pages. Choose whether to show:

• Show Previous/Next: add Previous and Next buttons for simple navigation;
• Show Page Numbers: show numbered pages for precise control;
• Use Icons: use arrow icons for previous/next buttons instead of the text.

Managing Multiple Directories

Successful sites benefit from multiple directories serving different purposes. Develop a comprehensive strategy with a main directory showcasing everyone, membership-specific directories highlighting each tier, and specialized directories for interests or regions.

Maintain design consistency across directories using similar card layouts, consistent color schemes, predictable navigation placement, and universal typography rules. This creates a professional appearance while reducing cognitive load.

Optimize performance by limiting items per page, ensuring proper image sizing, implementing lazy loading, and enabling appropriate caching for public directories.

Directory SEO and Discovery

Well-optimized directories become significant traffic drivers. Create descriptive page titles including relevant keywords. Write unique meta descriptions that explain the directory's value. Add introductory content to help search engines understand the purpose, while naturally including keywords.

Strategic internal linking helps discovery. Include directory links in the main navigation, mention access as a membership benefit, and link between related directories. Enable social sharing with attractive preview images to encourage members to share their presence.