How do business owners take control of their own listing?

They claim it. An owner enters a work email on the business's own domain; if it matches the listing's website the code is emailed and verification is instant — subdomains count, free mailboxes like Gmail never do. Anything that doesn't match lands in your admin queue instead of being rejected. Verification codes are stored hashed, with a time limit, an attempt cap and a resend cooldown. Claiming can be free or carry a one-time fee, your choice.

How does a local directory actually make money?

Four lines, all built in. Premium listings are a one-time charge ($15 by default). Promotion placements are monthly — a header banner, a card in the catalogue, a card in the listing sidebar — with capacity caps and a 30% discount if a business takes all three. Sponsor slots are capped at eight, and everyone after that joins a waitlist. The strongest line is lead subscriptions: an owner pays monthly to receive every matching quote request in their category or city.

How do you rank for 'plumber in Austin' style searches?

The platform generates location landing pages from your live listings — /hvac-services-in-roseville-ca and hundreds like it — each with a real listing count, a location FAQ, breadcrumb and ItemList structured data, and links to nearby cities. Combinations with too few listings render noindex, so you build depth instead of the doorway pages Google demotes. The technical work is done; ranking still depends on your niche and your links.

How do I fill the directory before anyone has signed up?

Import a spreadsheet. The admin's CSV import maps your columns to the right fields and can mark every row unclaimed, so real owners can take them over later. The optional AI enrichment pass then visits each business's website and writes a clean description plus a few selling points. That's a few hundred listings seeded in an afternoon, live and useful before your first owner logs in.

I'm not technical — can I really launch this?

Yes. Two paths work for you. The Custom plan ($1599) is fully done-for-you: our team installs everything, customizes your design, connects your domain, and hands you a live site in up to 7 days. Or pick the DIY plan ($199) and follow our step-by-step guide — most people get to launch in 1–2 hours with help from ChatGPT, no coding background required.

What exactly do I get after purchase?

The full Next.js source code for a working local business directory, on your own hosting. Listings carry phone, business type, hours and selling points; owners claim and verify their own profiles; visitors send quote requests that you can sell as recurring leads; every business plots on an interactive map; and location landing pages generate from your live data. Around that sits the rest of a real product — auth, an admin panel, payments, search, ratings, email, a blog and 14 color themes. If you'd rather not touch any of it, the Custom plan team sets it up for you.

What happens after I pay for the Custom plan?

Within 24 hours you'll get a short questionnaire about your niche, brand, and the kind of listings you want to showcase. Our team handles the entire setup: hosting, payment connection, custom design matched to your brand, your domain, initial categories, and 100 seed listings. You receive your live site in up to 7 business days, plus hands-on launch support.

Do I need to pay separately for hosting or domain?

Hosting is free for normal traffic on Vercel (the platform we deploy to). You'll need a domain name (around $10–15/year from any registrar). For the database, email, and payments, you'll create free accounts on Supabase, Resend, and Stripe — all have generous free tiers that cover most early-stage directories. We walk you through every account on the Custom plan, or guide you in the docs for DIY.

Can I change the look and content myself after launch?

Yes — without writing code. Pick from 14 built-in color themes or design your own in the admin theme editor. Toggle features (ratings, comments, ads, newsletter, AI, blog) on or off through a settings page. Edit your site name, logo, contact info, and pricing through simple config screens. Add or remove categories, approve submissions, and run promotions — all from the admin panel.

What kind of directories can I build?

One config value picks the format. Local business is the flagship — HVAC contractors, dentists, gyms, tradespeople — and switching to it turns on claims, quote leads, local SEO pages and the map together. The same codebase also runs a classic directory (SaaS catalogs, AI tool listings, template galleries), a job board, and a Printful-powered online store.

Is this a SaaS or a one-time purchase?

One-time purchase. No subscriptions, no recurring fees. You pay once and own everything forever. Lifetime updates are included.

How many websites can I build with one purchase?

As many as you want. Every plan includes an unlimited-site license — once you own DirectoryLaunch you can build, launch, and sell unlimited directories and online stores with it, with no extra fee per site. The Custom plan includes that same unlimited license and adds a done-for-you setup service where our team configures and launches one site for you in up to 7 days; you can still spin up unlimited more sites yourself anytime.

Is there a refund policy?

Yes, we offer a 14-day money-back guarantee. If DirectoryLaunch doesn't meet your expectations, reach out and we'll refund you — no questions asked.

Can I build a SaaS directory with DirectoryLaunch?

Yes — SaaS directories are one of the most common use cases. DirectoryLaunch ships with category trees, search and filters, premium listings, sponsorships and Stripe-powered payments out of the box. See the SaaS directory walkthrough for a full feature breakdown.

Can I launch an AI tools directory?

Yes. AI tool catalogs are a perfect fit: built-in submissions, ratings, screenshots, tags and AI-assisted descriptions help you scale to thousands of listings. Most AI directories built on DirectoryLaunch go live in 1–2 weeks including content seeding.

How does DirectoryLaunch compare to building from scratch?

Building a directory from scratch typically takes 200–400 engineering hours for an MVP (auth, payments, admin panel, moderation, ratings, SEO, emails). DirectoryLaunch gives you all of that on day one for $199, with full source code and lifetime updates.

Is the code I get production-ready?

Yes. The codebase is the same one running on directory-launch.com and the demo site, used by paying customers in production. It is built on Next.js 16, React 19, Supabase and Stripe — modern, typed, and AI-friendly with included CLAUDE.md and Cursor rules.

Local business directory boilerplate

Launch a directory that local businesses pay to be in.

Everything a local directory needs is already built. Download it, hand it to Claude Code or Cursor, tell it your niche — and be live this week instead of three months from now.

Get lifetime access — $199 See the live demo

Pay once
Unlimited sites
Full source code
14-day refund

An AI-ready codebase that scales.

Built so a coding agent can extend it instead of rewriting it. CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md and Cursor rules ship in the repo, everything is typed end to end, and the parts that grow — schema, city pages, catalogue — were built to grow.

CLAUDE.md & AGENTS.md in the repo
Cursor rules & Copilot instructions
Typed end to end — agents don't guess
Agents edit config, not architecture
Versioned migrations as your schema grows
Hundreds of city pages, pre-rendered

Project structure

Repository structure

And everything else a real website needs, already done.

The unglamorous half — accounts, search, reviews, analytics, legal pages, spam protection. The part that takes months and that nobody remembers to budget for.

Accounts & sign-in
Email or Google sign-in with a password-reset flow, separate roles for you, your staff and business owners, and every table locked so nobody reads a row that isn't theirs.
AI that fills the catalogue
Import a spreadsheet of businesses, then let it visit each website and write the description and selling points. Hundreds of listings in an afternoon.
Email & notifications
Six lifecycle emails already written, campaigns you can send to businesses by city or category, and a Telegram bot that lets you approve listings from your phone.
Finding a business
Search across every word of every listing, filters for category, type and price, and six ways to sort the results.
Reviews & trust
Five-star ratings capped at one per person, comments you can moderate or switch off, and a way to save businesses for later.
Who's visiting
Visitor stats kept in your own database, not a third party's — and slots for Google Analytics and PostHog if you want them.
More than one language
Run the whole site in several languages, with a switcher in the header and emails that go out translated too.
Your own content
A blog you write from the admin panel, a changelog page for your updates, and privacy and terms pages ready to edit.
City pages that rank
Hundreds of 'HVAC services in Roseville, CA' pages generated from your live listings, each with a real count, a local FAQ and links to nearby towns. Thin ones hide themselves so Google sees depth, not doorways.
The rest of your SEO
Titles and descriptions on every page, a sitemap that keeps itself current, and share images generated per page.
Keeping it clean
Spam traps on every public form, rate limits so nobody can hammer your site, and scheduled jobs that run themselves.
Getting it online
Free hosting on Vercel for normal traffic, your own domain pointed at it, and a guide for every account you'll need.

Showcases

Real directories built with DirectoryLaunch

Live sites running on the same boilerplate you'll get. Each one was set up by our team on the Custom plan.

winery-hotels.com

ailaunch.space

besttravelapps.online

directoryhunt.org

whatdrink.com

Want one like these?

Skip the build — our team designs and launches a custom directory for you.

Order a custom template

Aleksandr Osso

Founder of winery-hotels.com and posteahora.com

winery-hotels.com runs on this code. Everything it taught me about launching a directory — including the parts nobody thinks to budget for — is already in the repo you get.

Pricing

One purchase. Unlimited potential.

Pay once, own forever. No subscriptions, no recurring fees. Set it up yourself, or let our team launch it for you.

Basic

$199one-time

For developers who want to set it up themselves.

Pro

Custom

Done for you

Skip the setup. We launch your directory for you in up to 7 days.

A complete, ready-to-launch directory
Custom design matched to your brand
100 listings seeded in your catalog
Same unlimited-site license — plus we set up & launch one site for you
We install everything (no code touching for you)
Your domain connected and live
Hands-on launch support

From$1599

Live in up to 7 days

14-day money-back guarantee. No questions asked.

Applicable taxes may be added to the price at checkout.

Changelog

Shipped recently

The boilerplate keeps moving, and every release is included in your license — there is no upgrade to buy later.

commits: 286
weeks shipped: 16/26
last release: Sep 5

commits per week · last 26 weeks

Sep 5, 2026New

Seed a directory from Google Places

An admin screen that scans Google Places by business type and area and imports the results as unclaimed listings — with descriptions, photos, hours, coordinates, ratings and reviews.

Sep 5, 2026Improved

A seeded catalogue reads as new, not broken

A directory imported from an external source has no ratings of its own on day one. Cards, sorting and the caches now cope with that instead of showing a wall of zeros.

Sep 5, 2026Improved

Local business pages stopped reading like SaaS pages

The detail page still showed “Project Details — Pricing, Plan, Launch Date, Views” on a plumber, the maps button opened a dropped pin, and an always-open week rendered as 00:00–23:59.

Show all changes

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Your directory could be live next week.

Pay once. Launch fast. Own everything. Whether you set it up yourself or let our team do it for you.

See pricing View Live Demo

Pay once
Unlimited sites
Full source code
14-day refund

Questions before you buy? hello@directory-launch.com