The directory is a major feature of our segmentation area and tools.

It aims to provide users with a more interactive experience including rapid exporting and filtering of your contacts with a number of bulk actions you can take on the results.

Key features include setting up your own columns alongside filters to make exporting and viewing data about your contacts quicker and easier.

New bulk actions are included, such as 'Replace Field' which can be used to make bulk changes to certain contact fields against your filtered view of contacts. This makes bulk changes quicker and easier when you need to update a number of contacts in one go for a particular field.

Other familiar bulk actions such as email/SMS similar to segments will also be available as part of the beta release.

The main use cases for using the directory in this initial beta release will be for things like one-off filtering where you just want to quickly see how many people meet a certain set of rules as set in your filter. V5 users will be familiar with this experience where you just want to quickly generate a list of contacts and do something with them. This is different to a segment where a segment should always be used for dynamically segmenting your data with some form of structure and hierarchy for routine and regular tasks.

Another one will be to set the exact columns (fields) and the order in which they are presented in both the directory viewer and the exported Excel or CSV file. This is made incredibly simple and allows for selecting multiple fields at the same time to be added as columns and or filters. You can then re-order the columns by simply dragging them around from the config side panel. Again this is different to a segment where there are pre-set exports for the most useful use cases depending on the type of segment you are in, contacts vs membership segments for example. To create a custom export for segments, if required, currently means an additional step in setting up a custom field set from settings.

Finally, the bulk action 'Replace Field' will be exclusive to the directory and won't currently be available from segments.

Highlighted in yellow below, users can access the directory by going to Segments in the top nav and then on the second nav selecting Directory (Beta)
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When you enter the directory you will see a green bar under the main menus providing information about the data that is loaded.
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When you first load up the directory this will start loading in your contacts and will give you a percentage of how many it has loaded. This loading takes 20-60 seconds to fully complete but it happens in the background and therefore the directory is completely usable whilst it does this. Once loaded you will see a message saying how many records are loaded. See the second screenshot. This should be all of your contacts.

On the left-hand side under the 'Contact Directory' title, you will see a timestamp indicating how up-to-date the current directory is and beneath that it will tell you the filters currently applied to the directory.

On the right-hand side, you will see a familiar layout, with a button for your available actions, a filter-icon which will open the configure directory side panel and also page size options for viewing more than 100 records on the screen at any one time.
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Below the top items is the table view. By default, the columns will be Formatted Name, Email and Telephone but as you can see below, once you have configured the columns to your liking it will display the exact columns and the order in which you set them. You can apply any number or columns, if there are a lot of columns you will need to horizontally scroll the table to see all the data. You can then page through the table by clicking the next and prev buttons at the bottom of the page.

The configure view side panel is where you need to go to set up the columns and filters for your directory. To open the side panel click the filter icon next to the main actions menu from the directory view. The initial view will show the three default columns for the directory. However, these can be changed, removed or added to by using the options outlined below.

You can add a column or filter by clicking into 'Add column/Filter' field. Once clicked it will expand a large dropdown which allows you to select multiple fields at the same time to use as columns and or filters. Simply tick the ones you want and then click anywhere outside the dropdown or use the small cross icon seen just under the actions menu to close it.

Optionally type a field name that you know of or a keyword in order to get a reduced view of matching or partial matching fields available.
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You can toggle a column's visibility using the eye icon on the right of each row. You would use this when you have applied a number of filters but don't actually want those filters as viewable/exportable columns on your current directory view. To toggle a column's visibility just click the eye icon so it has a line through it. Press it again to toggle the visibility back on.

To remove a column or filter you can use either the red cross icon at the top right of each row or you can unselect the column/filter from the multi-select dropdown.

You can order columns by holding click and dragging the row using the little dots to the far left. Move them up and down to change the order in which they show in the directory and the export.
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Only show filters toggle as seen below is useful when you have many columns set up on your current view and you just want to see or work on your current filters. Toggling it will hide any columns without a filter.
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Reset Columns and Filters - This is the main action currently available from the configure view side panel it allows you to reset your views columns and filters back to the default intial view.
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Once you are happy with your columns and filters just hit the Apply button at the bottom of the side panel

There are a number of actions available from the directory as part of it's beta release. See below details on each of them and if there are any key differences between similar ones from segments.

The export to XLSX action will export the filtered data with all the columns you have set in the configure view side panel. Essentially giving you what you see on screen but in XLSX format. This is currently different to segments where you select a preset export option.

The export to CSV action will export the filtered data with all the columns you have set in the configure view side panel. Essentially giving you what you see on screen but in CSV format. From segments the is no option currently to export a CSV.
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Replace field is a new bulk action only available from the directory. It can be used to make bulk changes to certain contact fields against your filtered view of contacts. This makes bulk changes quicker and easier when you need to update a number of contacts in one go for a particular field. More fields will be added in the future for things like bulk tagging and bulk changes to certain membership fields.

The way it works is that it will replace any value currently stored on the contact for the selected field with the value you want to update to. So this will both overwrite any existing data and add new data to contacts that didn't have any previously.

To use the Replace Field bulk action, simply select the field you want to update and the value you want to update it to and click 'Review'.
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From the 'Review' step make sure the field and new value is correct and the amount of records is as well. You can then either commit the changes straight away or you can 'Run it in Safe Mode' first.
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Running in safe mode won't apply the updates to the records but you can preview what would happen if you did via a notification once it has been completed. You can then come back and re-run the replace field but commit changes instead. We recommend running in safe mode first but it is entirely up to you.

Advanced tools for admins when open.

Refetch Directory in place
Reset Directory and reload - Useful if you need to fully reset the the directory. Use with caution.
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If you have made a number of recent changes to contacts data then you can force a rebuild of the directory if you do not want to wait for the automatic updates. Automatic updates happen roughly every 20 minutes, the longest you would likely need to wait is 30 minutes to see the latest changes. Forcing the the rebuild via this action and then waiting 5 minutes will give you the latest data quicker if needed.

This happens automatically in the background every 5 minutes and you will see a notification popup when it is doing this, however, we have provided a way to check for updates in between if you really need to.

This works the same as from segments, allowing you to send an email/sms in bulk to your contacts. You can select a pre-existing template or type out the subject and message as you need.
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​Please note that there is a hard limit of sending 1500 emails in any one action. So filtered results on more than this number will need to be broken down into smaller filtered data sets. If that is required setting up segments for the task will be easier as you can just create sub-segments.
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This will show you the first-time information popup and also provide a link to this article to learn more about how the directory works.

There are a couple of important pieces of information that you need to know about the directory.

The data in the directory is downloaded and stored in your web browser's local storage for the entirety of the session it is active for, this applies to each new session. This process happens in the background as soon as you click into the directory. To fully load the directories data it usually takes anywhere from 20-60 seconds depending on your connection and the size of your contacts data, you are however, free to use the directory whilst it's doing this and this only happens once per session. Updates to the data will happen periodically every ~25 minutes and pull in any new changes made to your contacts during that time. You can also force a rebuild of the directory quicker than the automated updates if you require and this can be done via the actions menu and selecting 'Rebuild directory', then, after about 5 minutes, you can check for updates.

The directory database will remain in your local storage until you log out or your session expires. The reason for storing the data in the browser's local storage is that we can interact with that data far quicker than traditionally possible. This translates into much faster filtering and the ability to add and populate columns on the fly.