DirectoryCustomize — Visibility Engine — Help

Control what visitors see across your entire directory — member profiles, post detail pages, and any widget — with mode-based gating, per-plan customization, and a visual rules engine.

What it does

Visibility Engine controls what visitors can see across your directory site. It works on three levels:

1. Member profiles — gate logged-out visitors with cutoff/fade, paywall, or button-only treatments
2. Post detail pages — gate event pages, blog articles, job listings, all 14 built-in BD post types, and any custom post types you create
3. Any widget — show, hide, blur, lock, dim, or replace individual widgets based on who is viewing

The engine does not replace your content — BD still renders everything first, then VE overlays the gating treatment on top. Your SEO stays intact because search engines see the full page content.

Where it lives

In your DirectoryCustomize plugin admin: Plugins → DirectoryCustomize → My Widgets → Visibility Engine.

Four configuration areas across three tabs:

1. Profile Settings — mode picker, cutoff options, header button treatment, phone display, CTA card content, per-plan customization, integrations. An info card at the top links to the Visibility Rules tab with the note "Non-profile widget gating is controlled independently in the Visibility Rules tab."
2. Visibility Rules — per-widget and per-post-type rule cards with a visual condition builder
3. Design — CTA card colors, typography (fonts, sizes, weights), fade height, paywall blur intensity

Saves apply immediately — no rebuild or republish needed.

Two-part install

The Visibility Engine is a two-widget system:

Both widgets are configured from the same panel — VE Loader has no settings of its own.

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Profile gating

Two-level enable toggle

The Visibility Engine has two switches, not one:

This lets you configure and test widget/post rules without affecting live profile pages.

Mode picker

The mode controls how logged-out visitors experience member profiles.

When Visibility Rules are active and override the Mode setting for some visitors, a yellow warning banner appears at the top of the Profile Settings tab showing which verdicts are in effect (e.g. "currently forcing: Paywall, Cutoff & Fade") with a link to edit the rules. The Mode value serves as the fallback for visitors that don't match any rule.

Cutoff mode options

When mode is Cutoff & Fade, extra fields appear:

About the "After Tab Nav" option — this shows the tab BUTTONS but fades the tab CONTENT. Visitors see there are more tabs (Reviews, Photos, Specialties) without seeing what's in them, which drives sign-up curiosity. It's the strongest teaser pattern.

Header buttons treatment

The Send Message / See Phone / Write Review buttons at the top of the profile have their own behavior, independent of the mode:

When you pick Rename + redirect, three text/URL pairs appear so you can customize each button independently — useful for tracking which button drives the most sign-ups (set different UTM params per button).

Phone number in profile body

Separate from the header See Phone button, the profile body has a phone row showing the actual digits. The engine treats this independently:

Common pattern: keep the header "Sign Up to See Phone" button visible as a sign-up driver, but Hide or Mask the digits row so logged-out visitors can't read the number elsewhere on the page.

CTA card

The CTA card is the only piece the engine renders itself — everything else is BD's native content with overlays on top. Seven fields control its content:

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Post detail page gating

The Visibility Engine can gate entire post detail pages — not just member profiles. This covers all 14 built-in BD post types, plus any custom post types you create:

Custom post types: any custom post type you have created also appears in the Gate a post page menu and gates its detail pages the same way — you are not limited to the built-in types above.

How to gate a post page

1. Open Visibility Rules tab
2. Click Gate a post page in the toolbar
3. Pick a post type from the dropdown (already-added types are greyed out)
4. A new rule card appears for that post type — set conditions and a verdict
5. The VE Loader widget (installed in a sitewide zone) evaluates these rules when a visitor lands on any post of that type

Post page rules support these verdicts:

Cutoff & Fade options for post pages

When you choose Cutoff & Fade on a post page rule, an element picker controls where the content cuts off:

Below the cutoff, a CTA card appears with full per-group customization: heading, subtitle, button text, button URL, help prompt text, help link text, and help URL. Each rule group can have its own CTA content -- for example, one message for logged-out visitors and a different upsell for free-tier members.

The CTA card uses position: sticky so it stays visible at the top of the viewport on long post pages instead of rendering below the fold.

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Post page action buttons

When a post detail page is gated (events, listings, jobs, etc.), the page still has action buttons -- typically Contact Member and More Details (or RSVP, Apply, etc. depending on post type). The post action buttons section lets you control those buttons independently from the page gating verdict.

This section appears inside each post page rule card and each widget rule card that uses a cutoff or lock verdict. For post page rules using the lock verdict, the full CTA card customization (icon, heading, subtitle, button text/URL, help prompt, help link, help URL) is also available alongside the button treatment -- so both the overlay card and the action buttons can be customized per rule group.

Button treatment

Rename + redirect fields

When you pick Rename + redirect, four fields appear in a 2x2 grid:

Common pattern for events: set Contact button to "Log In to Contact Host" with URL /login, and Details button to "Log In to RSVP" with URL /login. This turns the event page buttons into login prompts without hiding the event content.

Each post page rule card and each configurable widget verdict card has its own button treatment settings, so you can apply different treatments to different post types or widgets.

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Widget gating (Visibility Rules)

Beyond profiles and post pages, VE can gate any individual widget on your site. Rules evaluate top-to-bottom and the first matching group wins.

Adding widget rules

Click Add widget rule to open the widget picker. It has two tabs:

Tab 1 — Pick an installed widget has three numbered options:

Tab 2 — Gate by CSS selector lets you gate any DOM element by entering a friendly name and a CSS selector (e.g. .related-members-links). The panel includes instructions for finding selectors via browser DevTools (right-click an element, Inspect, copy the selector). CSS selector rules show a purple CSS badge on their rule card.

Use Tab 2 when: a BD widget is not in the pre-mapped list, you want to gate a specific page section or third-party block, or you need to target a custom DOM element.

Once you pick a widget or enter a selector, a new rule card appears.

The toolbar

The Rules tab has a sticky toolbar at the top with:

• Add widget rule — pick a widget to gate
• Gate a post page — dropdown showing your site's post types, with custom types at the top and standard BD types below. The list pulls dynamically from your site so any custom post types you create automatically appear.
• Expand all / Collapse all — manage long rule lists
• Presets — one-click rule templates (see below)
• Filter bar — search/filter rules by name, verdict type (blur, lock, hide, etc.), or rule kind (widget, page, post page). Appears when you have multiple cards. Each card generates filter tags for faceted filtering.

Rule presets

Presets add pre-built rule templates with one click. Nine active presets:

The presets panel also shows upcoming presets marked Coming Soon (greyed out and unclickable): URL parameter trigger, Referrer-based access, Gate stale listings, Seasonal/date range, Launch day countdown, and Geo-lock content. These are planned but not yet functional.

How rules are organized

Rules live in rule cards — one card per widget or post type that you gate. Inside each card:

• An on/off toggle in the card header — turn a whole rule off without deleting it. You can keep more than one rule card on the same target (widget or page) and switch which one is active: turning one on automatically turns off the other cards on that same target, so only one runs at a time.
• A default action dropdown sets the verdict when no rule group matches
• One or more rule groups each return a specific verdict when their conditions match
• Groups can be enabled/disabled independently and reordered using up/down arrow buttons on each group
• When two or more groups exist, a blue info banner appears: "Order matters -- rules evaluate top to bottom. The first matching group wins. Use the arrows to reorder."
• Groups that use configurable verdicts (lock, replace, badge, redirect, blur) show an inline customizer panel

All verdict types

Hide: remove vs keep layout space

Keep layout space controls how an element is hidden. You set it in two places:

• On the rule itself — the Keep layout space checkbox in the "Add selector rule" popup and in the Edit (pencil) popup. Use this when the rule hides by default.
• On a rule group — the same checkbox appears in a group's header when that group's verdict is Hide. Use this when the element shows normally and only gets hidden when a condition matches.

Either one turns it on; you do not need both. The two options are:

• Off (default) — remove. The element is fully removed and takes no space. Best when it stands alone and nothing around it depends on its position.
• On — keep layout space. The element becomes invisible but keeps its box, so nearby content does not shift.

Rule of thumb: if hiding an element makes nearby content shift up or overlap, you wanted Keep layout space, not remove. This is most common on search-result cards — they are tightly gridded, and one element (like the posted date) often shares its row with another (like the favorites button) and holds the spacing together. Removing it collapses that space; keeping it preserves the layout.

Selectors: class names and full paths

The CSS selector field accepts more than a single class name.

• Just the class name works. Type posted_meta_data and the leading dot is added for you.
• Full CSS selector paths work too, because the engine matches every element on the page that fits the selector. Useful when two different things share one class:
• .post-location-snippet.bmargin — compound class (both classes on the same element)
• .search_result .posted_meta_data — a descendant path
• .search_result:first-child — position-based
• Type the leading dot yourself when you use a path. The automatic dot is only added for a lone bare class name; anything with a space, dot, #, > or [ is used exactly as typed.
• Every match is gated, not just the first — so a selector that repeats once per search-result row applies to all of them.

Verdict customizer

When you pick a configurable verdict, a customizer panel opens inline below the verdict dropdown:

Blur verdict — enter blur intensity per rule group: light, medium (default), or strong. This is separate from the Design tab's paywall blur slider -- it controls per-rule blur strength.

Lock verdict — by default uses a standard lock card (lock icon, "Members Only" heading, "Sign up to unlock this content" subtitle, sign-up button). Uncheck "Use the standard lock card" to customize: icon (emoji or image URL), heading, subtitle, button text, button URL, help prompt text, help link text, help URL. On post page rules, the lock customizer also includes the full CTA card fields and button treatment section.

Replace verdict — two modes via radio buttons: Custom HTML (a textarea to enter markup that replaces the widget content) or Another widget (a widget picker that swaps the gated widget's content with a different widget from your site -- pick, change, or clear the replacement widget).

Badge verdict — enter badge text, pick a color (color picker + hex input), pick a position (four corner options), and optionally check Reserve space so the badge does not overlap content (adds padding on the badge side instead of floating over the corner).

Redirect on click — enter the destination URL.

Context keys — what you can match on

Custom field rules

The Viewer Custom Field and Post Custom Field keys let you build rules based on any custom field on your site. When you select either one, a second dropdown appears showing all available fields from your database, organized in two groups:

• Custom Fields — fields you or your site admin added (shown first)
• Standard Fields — built-in BD fields like Post Date, Post Clicks, etc.

When you pick a field, the value dropdown populates with the actual values that exist in your data. If a field is brand new and no posts have been submitted with it yet, you can type the value manually — it works the same way. To seed the dropdown with options, create a test post with that field filled in.

Just added a field in Form Manager? Click the small refresh icon (↻ Refresh fields) right next to the field dropdown to reload the field list immediately — no page reload needed. Newer and renamed form fields appear here too, including fields that don't have their own database column (BD stores those separately, and the rules engine reads them the same way when the post has been saved with a value).

Tip for checkbox fields: If your form uses checkboxes where multiple options can be selected (like an Audience field with "Consultants" and "Nonprofits"), BD saves multiple selections as a comma-separated value like consultants,nonprofits. Use the contains operator instead of equals so your rule matches whether one or both options are checked. For example, Post Custom Field: filter_by_audience contains consultants will match posts where only Consultants is checked AND posts where both Consultants and Nonprofits are checked. Using equals on consultants would miss posts where both are checked.

Operators

The operator dropdown filters automatically to only show operators valid for the chosen key's value type.

AND / OR tree

Rule groups use an alternating-depth pattern:

• The root of each group picks AND or OR
• Nested groups alternate automatically — if root is AND, children are OR, grandchildren are AND again
• Each level shows a pill button labeled with its operator — click to add conditions or nest deeper
• The active AND or OR for a group is shown bold; the "add condition" buttons are muted, so it is easy to see which logic is governing the group

Rule warnings

The builder checks each group as you edit and shows a warning on any group that could never work the way it is written. The warning updates live — it clears the moment you fix the condition, with no need to save or refresh.

• "This group matches no one" (red) — the group can never match a real visitor. The most common cause is a Logged out condition combined with a viewer field (for example Active is none of…): a logged-out visitor has no viewer data, so that field can never satisfy the condition, and an AND group needs every condition to match. The fix is usually to remove the viewer condition, or to target logged-in members instead. It also appears when two conditions contradict each other (for example the same field set equal to two different values).
• "This group matches everyone" (amber) — an OR group includes a broad condition such as Logged out that on its own matches every logged-out visitor, so the other conditions in that group do not narrow it. If you meant to combine the conditions, switch the group to AND.

A group that trips a warning still saves — the warning is a heads-up, not a block — but until you resolve it, that group will not gate the way you intend.

Example rule patterns

Block paid-tier profiles from logged-out viewers, free-tier visible to anyone

```

Default: show

Group 1: When (Viewed plan ID is one of: 5,7,12) → blur

```

Show full profile on mobile after hours, gate during business hours

```

Default: hide

Group 1: When (Device = Mobile) AND (Time of day >= 18 OR Time of day < 8) → show

```

Gate events by audience field (only consultants can see consultant-only events)

```

Default: show

Group 1: When (Post Custom Field: filter_by_audience contains consultants) AND (Auth = Logged out) → lock

Group 2: When (Post Custom Field: filter_by_audience contains consultants) AND (Viewer plan ID = 5) → lock

```

The first group locks logged-out visitors. The second locks free-tier members (plan 5) who are not consultants. Consultant-tier members see the full event.

Always show admins the full profile

```

Default: hide

Group 1: When (Viewer role = Admin) → show

```

Gate event pages for non-members

```

Post page: Events

Default: show

Group 1: When (Auth = Logged out) → lock

```

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Gating by member status vs. a custom field

Visibility Engine can only personalize content for members your directory treats as logged in, and a member's account status decides that. This trips a lot of people up, so it is worth understanding.

Account statuses and gated content

When a member is anything other than Active, BD hands VE a visitor with no membership attached — the same as an anonymous visitor. So a rule that checks the member's plan or a viewer field has nothing to read for them and can never match. (This is the same reason the builder shows the red "This group matches no one" warning when you combine Logged out with a viewer field.)

The pattern: keep members Active, gate on a custom field

If you want fine-grained control over who sees which content — without fighting the status behavior above — do not use account status as your gate. Instead:

1. Keep the members Active. Active is the only status where VE can read their plan and custom fields.
2. Add a custom member field in Form Manager — for example a simple yes/no field like Content Access, or a dropdown like Approval Stage (pending / approved).
3. Gate on that field with a Viewer Custom Field rule instead of on Auth status or plan — for example Viewer Custom Field: Content Access equals no → lock.

Now you decide exactly who sees what by setting that field per member, and it keeps working because the member stays Active.

Note on visibility: setting a member to Active also makes their profile public and searchable — there is no "active but hidden" status in BD. If you need a member to have content access while their profile stays out of public search, gate the profile the same way: put a field on the profile and use a Post Custom Field rule plus search-result gating (below) to hold it back.

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Search-result gating (gate the results grid)

Profile and post-page gating cover a single page. Search-result gating covers the repeating grid of result cards on a search or category page — "show the first few, then gate the rest."

Adding a search-result gate

In the Visibility Rules toolbar, click Gate a search result and pick a post type from the dropdown (the same list as Gate a post page). A type already gated shows "(added)" and is greyed out.

Gates are per post type — you can gate events after 3 and leave blog articles alone. One gate covers both list view and grid view, so you never need two.

Where the gate falls

The panel at the top of the rule card sets only where the gate falls:

• Result card selector — filled in for you, scoped to that post type's results page. Only change it if you use a custom search-results template; a Reset to default link appears once you have.
• Gate after how many — cards up to that number stay visible to everyone.

What happens at the gate

That is the verdict on each rule group, exactly like every other rule. You get the full verdict list, and the group's conditions decide who it applies to.

The two most useful on a results grid:

• Lock — blurs every card past the gate and shows one call-to-action card at the gate. This is the classic "sign up to see all results" paywall. (On a results grid Lock does not overlay every card — that would be unreadable.)
• Inject a block — gates nothing. Every card stays visible and a block is inserted at the gate position: either a DirectoryAds slot or your own custom HTML.

Hide, Blur, Dim, Inert, Badge and Redirect on click also work, applied to each card past the gate.

A new gate starts with one group set to Lock for logged-out visitors, with the call-to-action text pre-filled from the post type's name. Edit or delete that group like any other.

Notes

• A gate with no rule groups does nothing — the verdict lives on the group, so add at least one.
• Lazy-loaded and paginated results are handled. As more cards load, the gate re-applies to the new ones automatically.
• The DirectoryAds slot reserves the position now; the ad creative is managed in DirectoryAds later.
• Search engines still index the cards you leave visible before the gate.

Per-plan customization

Override any CTA field for a specific membership plan. The plan picker shows all your membership plans — including non-searchable plans (marked with "no profile" in the dropdown).

For each plan you can override:

• Mode (Buttons only / Cutoff / Paywall)
• About excerpt character limit
• CTA heading, subtitle, button text, button URL
• Help prompt text, help link text, help URL

Leave any field blank to inherit the default. Each plan stores its own overrides — switch between plans in the dropdown to configure each one. Changes autosave 1.5 seconds after you stop typing. Use the Clear overrides button to reset a plan back to defaults.

Per-plan customization uses the viewed member's plan (not the visitor's plan). When a visitor views a premium member's profile, they see that plan's customized CTA; when they view a free member's profile, they see the free-tier CTA.

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Design tab

The Design tab gives you complete visual control over the CTA card, sign-up button, and overlay effects. Everything else on the page inherits your site's native styling so the gated treatment blends in.

Design presets

At the top of the Design tab, a color preset picker lets you apply a complete color theme to the CTA card and overlay in one click (e.g. Bootstrap, Shoreline, Ember, and 25+ others). Two refinement controls:

• Tint offset — a slider from -30 to +30 that shifts lightness across the entire preset palette, letting you darken or lighten the theme without hand-picking colors
• Rotations — variant color arrangements within the same preset (different accent/background combinations)

Some presets are locked as premium -- unlockable presets show a lock icon. Select a preset, adjust tint and rotation, then fine-tune individual colors below if needed.

Colors

CTA card — Background, border, corner radius (Square / Subtle / Rounded / Pill), shadow (None / Subtle / Medium / Strong).

Headline & body — Heading color, subtitle color, login link color.

Sign-up button — Background, text color, size (Small / Medium / Large / Extra Large), corner radius (Square / Subtle / Rounded / Pill).

Typography

Full font control for every text element on the CTA card — each section lets you pick a font family, size, and weight. Font families show each option rendered in its own typeface so you can preview before selecting. Weight options show their actual weight for quick comparison.

CTA heading — Font family (15 fonts), font size, weight (Normal through Extrabold).

CTA subtitle — Font family, font size, weight (Light through Semibold).

Sign-up button — Font family, weight (Normal through Bold). Button size is set in the Colors section.

Overlay effects

Cutoff fade — Fade height (None / Subtle / Medium / Strong) — controls how tall the gradient is before the CTA card.

Paywall blur — Blur intensity with a live preview (Hint / Subtle / Medium / Strong) — controls how much of the content is readable behind the overlay.

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Integrations

The Visibility Engine connects with other DirectoryCustomize widgets when both are installed. Each integration appears as its own card on the Profile Settings tab.

Highlighter integration

The Highlighter widget styles individual tabs (Reviews, Premium, etc.) with ribbons, glows, and animations. VE connects to it in two ways:

Both toggles are mirrored on Highlighter's own Configure panel — saving in either place updates the other.

DirectoryAds integration

When DirectoryAds is installed and Show ad slots behind paywall blur is on, ad zones render behind the blurred profile content in paywall mode. You monetize the impression even when the visitor cannot see the profile. Only applies in paywall mode.

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How settings are stored

VE settings are stored separately from the widget code (in widget_settings). This means:

• Reverting the widget to BD's default or reinstalling a DC override only swaps the underlying code — your CTA text, mode picks, rules, design colors, and per-plan overrides carry over to the new version
• Settings persist across plugin updates
• Multiple widgets can read VE settings (the member-profile widget reads them at render time)

When you save, VE automatically clears the render cache for both itself and any consumer widgets (like member-profile) so changes appear on the live site immediately.

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Common questions

Need more help?

If a rule isn't behaving the way you expect:

1. Open the Visibility Rules tab and review your rule groups top-to-bottom
2. Check which group matches the visitor's context and what verdict it returns
3. If a group fires that shouldn't -- review its conditions (the operator filter prevents most nonsense matches, but typos in text values can slip through)
4. If no group fires when one should -- check that the group is Enabled (the checkbox at the top of each group)
5. Check the Profile Settings tab for the yellow rules-override banner -- it shows which verdicts are currently active

Still stuck? Contact support with:

• Your directory URL
• The visitor's context (auth state, plan ID, device, page they were viewing)
• A screenshot of your Rules tab showing the groups in question