courier-notification-skills

A comprehensive agent skill for building production-ready notification systems across multiple channels. Covers everything from email deliverability to push permission priming, with a focus on user experience and reliability.

For AI Agents & Developers: This skill provides structured guidance for implementing notifications with the Courier API. Use it to send emails, SMS, push notifications, Slack messages, and more through a unified interface.

Why Use This Skill

• Multi-channel notifications — Send messages via email, SMS, push, Slack, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp, and in-app inbox from a single API
• Production-ready patterns — Battle-tested code examples for authentication flows, order updates, billing alerts, and more
• Developer-first — TypeScript, Python, CLI, and curl examples for key patterns

Who This Is For

• Developers building SaaS, e-commerce, marketplaces, or mobile apps
• Teams consolidating notification providers into a single API
• Engineers implementing user preferences, unsubscribe handling, or multi-channel routing

Installation

Cursor (global, available in all projects):

git clone https://github.com/trycourier/courier-skills.git ~/.cursor/skills/courier-skills

Cursor (project-specific):

git clone https://github.com/trycourier/courier-skills.git .cursor/skills/courier-skills

Claude Code:

git clone https://github.com/trycourier/courier-skills.git ~/.claude/skills/courier-skills

Claude Code discovers skills from ~/.claude/skills/ automatically. The skill's SKILL.md frontmatter (name and description fields) is used for discovery — no additional configuration needed.

Other AI Assistants (Windsurf, Cline, etc.):

Clone to the skill directory supported by your assistant, or point it at the SKILL.md file manually. The skill follows standard markdown conventions and works with any AI coding tool that supports agent skills.

What This Skill Covers

Channels

• Email (deliverability, SPF/DKIM/DMARC, design)
• SMS (10DLC registration, character limits)
• Push notifications (iOS/Android, permission priming)
• In-app inbox (real-time, badges, read states)
• Slack (Block Kit, bot setup)
• Microsoft Teams (Adaptive Cards)
• WhatsApp (templates, 24hr window)

Transactional Notifications

• Authentication (password reset, OTP, verification, security alerts)
• Orders (confirmation, shipping, delivery)
• Billing (receipts, dunning, subscriptions)
• Appointments (booking, reminders, rescheduling)
• Account (welcome, profile updates, settings)

Growth Notifications

• Onboarding (activation, first value, setup)
• Feature adoption (discovery, education, milestones)
• Engagement (activity, retention, habits)
• Re-engagement (winback, cart abandonment)
• Referral (viral loops, invites, rewards)
• Campaigns (promotional, upgrades)

Cross-Cutting Guides

• Quickstart (send your first notification)
• Multi-channel orchestration and routing
• User preference management
• Reliability (idempotency, retry logic, webhook signature verification)
• Batching and digests
• Throttling and rate limiting
• Notification catalog by app type
• Journeys (multi-step notification sequences via API — delays, branches, throttling)
• Template management (CRUD, versioning, publish lifecycle)
• Elemental content format (element types, control flow, localization)
• Reusable code patterns (idempotency, consent, quiet hours, masking, retry)
• CLI (ad-hoc operations, debugging, agent workflows)
• MCP Server (structured API access for AI agents, setup for all editors)
• General migration (from any custom or third-party system)
• Migrate from Knock (concept mapping, code migration)
• Migrate from Novu (concept mapping, code migration)

Structure

courier-skills/
├── SKILL.md                    # Start here - routes to the right resource
├── README.md                   # This file
└── resources/
    ├── channels/               # Channel-specific best practices
    │   ├── email.md
    │   ├── sms.md
    │   ├── push.md
    │   ├── inbox.md
    │   ├── inbox-v7-legacy.md
    │   ├── slack.md
    │   ├── ms-teams.md
    │   └── whatsapp.md
    ├── transactional/          # Transactional notification types
    │   ├── index.md
    │   ├── authentication.md
    │   ├── orders.md
    │   ├── billing.md
    │   ├── appointments.md
    │   └── account.md
    ├── growth/                 # Growth & lifecycle notifications
    │   ├── index.md
    │   ├── onboarding.md
    │   ├── adoption.md
    │   ├── engagement.md
    │   ├── reengagement.md
    │   ├── referral.md
    │   └── campaigns.md
    └── guides/                 # Cross-cutting concerns
        ├── quickstart.md
        ├── cli.md
        ├── mcp.md
        ├── multi-channel.md
        ├── preferences.md
        ├── reliability.md
        ├── batching.md
        ├── throttling.md
        ├── catalog.md
        ├── journeys.md
        ├── templates.md
        ├── routing-strategies.md
        ├── providers.md
        ├── elemental.md
        ├── patterns.md
        ├── migrate-general.md
        ├── migrate-from-knock.md
        └── migrate-from-novu.md

Quick Start

Open SKILL.md - it has a routing table that directs you to the right resource based on what you need to do.

Integrations & Providers

This skill covers best practices for working with:

Channel	Providers
Email	SendGrid, Amazon SES, Postmark, Mailgun, Resend, SparkPost
SMS	Twilio, MessageBird, Vonage, Plivo, Telnyx
Push	Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM), Apple Push Notification Service (APNs), Expo
Chat	Slack, Microsoft Teams
Messaging	WhatsApp Business API, Facebook Messenger

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I send a notification with Courier?
Call client.send.message({ message: { to, template, data } }) with the Node SDK (@trycourier/courier) or client.send.message(message={...}) with the Python SDK (trycourier). Both SDKs read the API key from the COURIER_API_KEY environment variable by default. See the channel-specific guides for full examples.

What's the difference between transactional and marketing notifications?
Transactional notifications are triggered by user actions (password reset, order confirmation). Marketing notifications are sent proactively for engagement.

How do I handle notification preferences?
See resources/guides/preferences.md for implementing user preference centers, channel opt-outs, and frequency controls.

How do I ensure email deliverability?
Configure SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. Warm up your sending domain. Monitor bounce rates. Full guide in resources/channels/email.md.

What about rate limiting and throttling? Courier handles provider rate limits automatically. For custom throttling logic, see resources/guides/throttling.md.

Contributing

Found an issue or want to add a notification pattern? PRs welcome.

License

MIT © Courier, Inc.

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Built for the Courier notification platform. Works with any AI coding assistant that supports agent skills.