Directorist v8.10: AI Setup, a New Dashboard, and Easier Product Management

Directorist has always given you two solid starting points for running a directory: a setup wizard to get a new directory type off the ground, and a growing library of extensions to build on top of it as your site grows. Both have done their job well. Directorist v8.10 takes each of them a step further, aimed squarely at making the two busiest moments in running a directory site — setting one up, and managing everything you’ve added since — faster and easier to handle.

The setup wizard now builds your listing fields directly from a plain-English description of the directory you’re creating, so your first setup starts closer to finished. Once your site is live and growing, a new Dashboard brings setup progress, site-wide numbers, recent activity, and common tasks into one view. The adjacent Themes and Extensions tab handles the products connected to your Directorist account. Alongside those two upgrades, this release also includes 13 fixes across admin notifications, listing renewals, mobile search, and several import and form workflows.

Here’s what’s actually in it, and what it means for how you run your directory.

TL;DR: Directorist v8.10 replaces the old template-picker setup wizard with an AI-powered one that builds a working directory — categories, fields, and sample listings — from a plain-English description. It also introduces a new Dashboard for setup progress, site-wide metrics, Recent Activity, and Quick Actions, alongside a refreshed Themes and Extensions screen for connecting your Directorist account and managing eligible products. Alongside those headline changes, this release fixes 13 issues covering admin email templates, mobile search filters, listing renewals, reviews, CSV imports, and more.

Table of Contents

1. Setting Up a Directory by Describing It, Not Picking a Template
2. A Dashboard for Progress, Activity, and Next Steps
3. Connect Your Account Through Themes and Extensions
4. Fixes That Make Everyday Management Steadier
5. Growing Your Directory Beyond This Update
6. Where That Leaves Us
7. FAQ

Setting Up a Directory by Describing It, Not Picking a Template

Directorist’s setup wizard has always helped new site owners get a directory type off the ground quickly, using ready-made templates for common categories like restaurants, real estate, or job boards. It’s a reliable starting point, and for a lot of directories, it’s all you need.

With v8.10, that starting point gets smarter. The wizard is now AI-powered: instead of picking a template and shaping it to fit afterward, you describe the directory you’re building in a sentence or two, or start from a preset (restaurant, job board, real estate, classifieds, service marketplace, local business, car, hotel, medical, legal) and refine it from there. Directorist takes that description to its own hosted AI service and generates a directory name, a set of starting categories, and listing form fields built around what you described — so a pet-grooming directory might get fields for grooming services and pet types, a B2B supplier directory might get fields for certifications and service regions, and a musical-instrument classifieds site might get fields for instrument type and condition, rather than everyone landing on the same generic form. Every generated field stays fully editable and can be regenerated with AI up to three times for that generated setup before you commit.

The wizard also carries a few options worth knowing about: a toggle to populate the new directory with sample listings so it doesn’t launch empty, a toggle to turn on monetization from day one, and a “Data sharing” toggle that lets you choose whether to share non-sensitive usage data to help improve Directorist. It can also detect your location automatically for a sensible default address. And if the AI service is ever unreachable, the wizard falls back to a local template automatically, so you can continue reviewing a starter setup.

One privacy note worth being clear about: the description you type is sent to Directorist’s own hosted setup service to generate your setup. You do not need to supply your own AI API key.

Altogether, this changes what a brand-new Directorist site looks like in its first few minutes — instead of a generic template you’d spend time adjusting afterward, it’s a directory already shaped around what you told it you’re building.

A Dashboard for Progress, Activity, and Next Steps

The Setup Wizard gets the foundation in place. The new Dashboard is where the ongoing work begins. After launch, it gives you one place to check setup progress, site-wide directory numbers, Recent Activity, and the tasks you are most likely to open next.

A setup checklist tracks four parts of the directory foundation: a directory type, listing categories, payment gateways, and published listings. Four site-wide cards summarize published listings, listing views, listings pending review, and revenue. Recent Activity can also surface listing, review, payment, registration, and expiration events, depending on what has happened on the site.

Quick Actions provides shortcuts for adding a listing, managing categories, changing the listing layout, adjusting the submission form, and opening email settings. On a multi-directory site, its Directory selector changes which directory those shortcuts target.

Worth knowing: The four metric cards report across the whole site. The Directory selector affects Quick Actions only; it does not filter the cards or Recent Activity. A 100% checklist means the four tracked foundation checks are complete, not that every part of the site is finished.

For a site with one directory type and a couple of extensions, this is a nice-to-have. For a site running several directory types and a growing extension list, it’s the kind of overview that turns “let me go check a few places” into one glance.

Connect Your Account Through Themes and Extensions

Themes and Extensions sits beside Dashboard in the top navigation. You can also open it directly from WP Admin → Directorist → Themes & Extensions. This separate screen brings the product catalog and account-backed product management into WordPress.

You can browse themes and extensions before connecting an account. When you are ready to connect, use either your Directorist Account login or the Access key available from your Directorist account dashboard. You only need one of these methods.

Once connected, products included with the account can show Install, along with the relevant activation or update action after installation. Products outside that account remain marketplace items and continue to show View Details. Connecting an account does not make every catalog product installable.

Fixes That Make Everyday Management Steadier

A handful of fixes in this release are worth calling out on their own, because of how often the affected flows get used:

Admin email templates now apply your actual customizations. If you’d edited the subject or body text for listing or order notification emails under Settings → Notifications, those customizations weren’t always being used when the email actually sent. They are now.

Mobile search filters are back when “View As” is off. On smaller screens, the filter toggle that opens your search filters was missing entirely if the “View As” display option was turned off — visitors on mobile had no way to open filters at all in that configuration. Fixed.

Recurring listings no longer expire while their subscription is still active. A listing on an active recurring plan could still get caught by the expiry process and marked expired incorrectly. That’s resolved — note that the subscription-status check itself lives in the Pricing Plans extension rather than core, so this fix matters most if you’re running paid, recurring listing plans.

Renewing an expired listing goes through approval properly again. Previously, renewing an expired listing could skip the admin-approval step and incorrectly reset its expiry window before it was actually approved. Now a renewed listing goes back to pending status and only has its expiry reset once you approve and publish it — the way it’s supposed to work.

Pending reviews show a clear confirmation notice. When a visitor submits a review that needs moderation, they now see a dismissible on-screen notice confirming it’s pending review, instead of wondering whether their submission went through at all.

A few more fixes round out this release:

• Conditional logic tied to categories in add-listing forms now evaluates correctly.
• CSV imports now assign categories correctly even when term names are shared across different taxonomies.
• Map address search now matches addresses with reordered postal codes (for example, “82800 Nègrepelisse” and “Nègrepelisse 82800” now both match).
• CSV import validation now correctly handles the temporary filenames WordPress assigns during upload.
• Frontend dashboard order text no longer shows untranslated strings.
• Custom fields no longer appear duplicated in listing card layouts.
• The FormGent enquiries dashboard no longer shows blank on WordPress 7.1.
• Listing cards on author profile pages now preserve the selected directory-type context.

If any of these issues persist after updating, contact Directorist Support rather than assuming the behavior is expected.

Growing Your Directory Beyond This Update

A faster setup and a clearer extensions dashboard both remove friction from building and maintaining your directory — but neither one sends you traffic. That’s a separate problem, and it’s the one we see trip up new and established directory owners alike: a well-built directory with almost no visitors.

If you just launched a new directory with the AI setup wizard and you’re wondering what comes after “it’s live,” or you’re an established site owner who’s been meaning to get serious about organic traffic, our Growth & SEO plan is built for exactly that handoff — turning a working directory into one that actually gets found.

Want to learn more? Book a call with our team.

Where That Leaves Us

The point of v8.10 is not simply three new screens. It creates a clearer path from the first directory idea to the work of running it: describe what you want to build, review the generated foundation, manage the site from Dashboard, and connect eligible account products through Themes and Extensions.

As always, back up your site before updating, then upgrade Directorist from your WordPress dashboard.

Update to v8.10 →

Read the AI Setup Wizard documentation

Read the Dashboard documentation

Read the Themes & Extensions documentation

If you try the AI setup wizard, or run into anything at all, tell us. We read every comment, and we build the next release around exactly this kind of feedback. You can also join the conversation in our Facebook Community.

FAQ

Read More

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• What’s New in Pricing Plans 4.1: Multiple Plans, More Control for Admin & Listing Owners