---
title: Setting up a project · Serpward
url: https://serpward.com/docs/setup/
description: The setup wizard step by step: project and brand, contacts, collection, whitelist, evidence, notice settings, queries — and what happens if a step is skipped.
source: Serpward (serpward.com)
---

**Sections**

[Docs](https://serpward.com/docs/) › Getting started

# Setting up a project

The setup wizard step by step: project and brand, contacts, collection, whitelist, evidence, notice settings, queries — and what happens if a step is skipped.

A project is one brand. The setup wizard takes you through everything a project needs before it can collect results and file notices. Steps can be skipped and returned to; the home page lists what is still worth finishing.

## Project

Name and brand. The brand is the name that appears in queries and notices; the project name is for you. Both can be changed later.

## Contacts

Who the notices are filed on behalf of, and where replies go. Until this is filled in, notices are not sent — the system will collect results and record pages, but nothing leaves. This is deliberate: a notice carries a real name and a real address, and it should be yours.

## Collection

How deep to look (how many positions of the result page) and how often to re-run each query. Defaults are sensible: the first page of results, once a day. Deeper and more often costs more credits and rarely changes what is found on the brand name.

## Whitelist

Your own domains and your licensed partners. Everything on the list is excluded before anything is reported. Put your main domain here first; add partners as you confirm them. The list can be edited at any time from the Whitelist tab, and adding a domain there also clears the pages already recorded for it — this is the emergency exit if a partner was reported by mistake.

## Evidence

What the capture looks for on a page: links to your original material, and the words that identify it — the passages a notice quotes. Suggestions are offered from your own pages; pick the ones that would not appear on an unrelated site. Evidence can be switched off for a project, in which case pages are recorded by position only and notices are not filed.

## Notice settings

Whether notices are sent at all, how long a page has to hold its position after discovery before a notice goes out (the wait after discovery), and how many notices a day the project may send. The wait exists because pages come and go; a page that vanishes on its own does not need a notice.

## Queries

The searches, one per line. A volume can follow after a semicolon (`brandname; 1200`) — it is used to estimate how much traffic an unauthorised page takes. Each query is set for a country, a language and a device; add the same query again for another market. See [Queries and markets](https://serpward.com/docs/queries-and-markets/).

## Done

The project starts collecting on its schedule. The first results appear after the first collection; the home page shows when the next one is due.

## If a step is skipped

The project still works as far as it can. Without contacts, nothing is sent. Without a whitelist, your own pages will be recorded as unauthorised until you add them. Without queries, nothing is collected. The home page says which of these applies, with a link to the step.