Infrastructure

The Email Infrastructure Playbook

Postmark, the SPF/DKIM/DMARC recipe, drip campaigns, and transactional vs marketing routing.

EMAIL-INFRASTRUCTURE-PLAYBOOK.md · 16 sections · 3,691 words · 30 KB · markdown

The sending engine. Domain authentication done right the first time, a layout system so every email looks like it came from the same company, drip campaign mechanics, and the routing rule that keeps transactional mail out of the opt-out gate.

What's inside

//Postmark setup with per-app servers and message streams
//The exact SPF / DKIM / DMARC DNS recipe
//A reusable email layout + component system
//Drip campaign schema and step-timing model
//Transactional vs marketing routing (and why transactional bypasses opt-out)
//Unsubscribe handling that satisfies CAN-SPAM

When to use it

Week 2, before the first lifecycle email goes out.

Build these first

App Infrastructure

Unlocks

Support Inbox, Email Automation Console, Cold Email Campaign

Straight from the file

Reference: src/lib/email/postmark.ts — single-file client with sendPostmarkEmail, sendBroadcastEmail, sendThreadedReply, isRetryablePostmarkError.

Table of contents

0. Use this spec
1. Architecture
2. Postmark account setup
3. DNS auth (SPF + DKIM + DMARC)
4. Schema
5. Layout wrapper + marketing-only sentinels
6. Drip-tick worker
7. Trigger events + enrollment
8. Transactional vs marketing routing
9. Unsubscribe handling (HMAC + one-click)
10. Postmark events webhook
11. Inbound mail webhook
12. Opt-out gating (drip worker side)
13. Sender resolution + merge context
14. Common pitfalls
15. Kickoff prompt

How to run it

Drop EMAIL-INFRASTRUCTURE-PLAYBOOK.md into your repo, then tell Claude Code: “Read EMAIL-INFRASTRUCTURE-PLAYBOOK.md and implement it in this codebase.” It's written for an agent to execute end to end. Search the file for angle-bracket placeholders and swap in your own project names, domains, and keys before the first run.

↓ Download the playbook

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