AWS SES Events: How We Use Streamdal For Event Monitoring

At Streamdal, we've developed a platform around complex real-time event data. One of the things we needed in the platform was an email service to welcome new customers, password resets, and monitoring alerts. We ended up selecting AWS SES (Simple Email Service) out of convenience since we already host services in AWS.

We found that the service works well, but it's very barebones when it comes to event metrics and observability compared to other email services like Mailchimp and Mailgun. Essentially, there are no granular metrics around individual events out of the box. You must set up a rather complex pipeline that we will dive into later.

To get useful information out of SES, we ended up configuring Streamdal to work with AWS Kinesis Firehose. Not only can it work with SES, but it can work with any Kinesis Firehose.

Conventional AWS SES Example Workflow

The following is the conventional AWS workflow example:

This setup allows you to view SES events in real time using the AWS service you have chosen as the destination for the Firehose stream.

The end result is that you end up running SQL queries against Redshift, which is not very user-friendly or managing an OpenSearch cluster, which requires significant time and resources.

Using Streamdal For AWS SES Event Monitoring

Streamdal's setup is very similar, except you do not point Kinesis Firehose to a costly, complex AWS service. Instead, you create a PUT request to a collection you created in console.streamdal.com. See our docs for the full setup process.

Setting Up Event Alerts From AWS SES

To show off the features you get out of the box with a Streamdal collection let's go through the steps of setting up Slack alerts for new signup 'Welcome Emails'.

Bonus: Easily Replay Event Messages

As your application matures, your sales pipeline and customer onboarding experience will also improve. However, this often requires combing through your database and modifying your services to accommodate old customers. This can be a complex and time-consuming process. With Streamdal, you can easily replay old events into new service topics, exchanges, or HTTP endpoints, making it much simpler to update your services as your application evolves.

Create A Destination And Topic To Send Events To

Replay Old Events Into New Service Topics/Exchanges Or HTTP Endpoints

Configure Replay

Now your new service can easily process events for existing customers.

Streamdal provides a powerful and flexible platform for processing and analyzing real-time event data from various sources, including AWS SES, Kinesis, and SNS. By configuring Streamdal to work with AWS Kinesis Firehose, you can access the full range of features provided by Streamdal, such as comprehensive observability and metrics, multiple alert endpoints, and rich monitoring capabilities. With Streamdal, you can easily manage your event data and make sense of the valuable insights it provides, improving your overall customer experience and enhancing your business operations.