The Importer is located with the DAM installation files in a separate zip file.

Create a folder where you want the app to be. It's recommended to use an "non-program-files" location to avoid windows rights managment issues or at least to set path configurations to a unc path outside. It's required to have write access to all configured directory paths.
Unzip the contents to the folder.
Run VersionSearches.sql against the DAM db in MSSQL Studio.
Set application level configuration in Importer.exe.config (app mode) and/or ImportService.exe.config (service mode). See Application configuration.
Set import level configuration in xml files in the subfolder ImportConfigs. See Import configuration.
Set metadata level configuration if needed.
Install as a service if you need. See section below. Set the service to start automatically.

Install as windows service

To install the Importer as a service execute this command in a windows command prompt in the directory of the Importer after adapting internal name, path to importer and displayname:

Windows command prompt

sc create ImportServiceInternalName binPath= "C:\PathToImporter\ImportService.exe" DisplayName= "Import Service Customer"

App mode vs. service mode

Running the Importer as service works essentially the same as in app mode. The differences are highlighted in the following table:

Feature	App mode	Service mode
Continous monitoring	No	Yes
Halt on fatal exception ¹⁾	Yes	No ²⁾

1) A fatal exception in this context means an error the Importer does not know how to safely proceed with. Specifically with data errors or data parse errors the Importer will take a safe approach and not do anything rather than set wrong metadata.

2) As a service if FailureDirectory is set the involved files will be moved and not retried. If not moved they will be retried.