SNS Topic for Scalable Partner Notifications

SAA-C03 By islever Editorial Last updated

Design scalable and loosely coupled architectures.

Short answer

B Create an Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) topic and subscribe partners to receive user IDs via HTTP.

Question

A social media company is creating a rewards program website for its users. The company gives users points when users create and upload videos to the website. Users redeem their points for gifts or discounts from the company's affiliated partners. A unique ID identifies users. The partners refer to this ID to verify user eligibility for rewards. The partners want to receive notification of user IDs through an HTTP endpoint when the company gives users points. Hundreds of vendors are interested in becoming affiliated partners every day. The company wants to design an architecture that gives the website the ability to add partners rapidly in a scalable way. Which solution will meet these requirements with the LEAST implementation effort?
  1. Create an Amazon Timestream database to keep a list of affiliated partners. Implement an AWS Lambda function to read the list. Configure the Lambda function to send user IDs to each partner when the company gives users points.
  2. Create an Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) topic. Choose an endpoint protocol. Subscribe the partners to the topic. Publish user IDs to the topic when the company gives users points. Correct Answer
  3. Create an AWS Step Functions state machine. Create a task for every affiliated partner. Invoke the state machine with user IDs as input when the company gives users points.
  4. Create a data stream in Amazon Kinesis Data Streams. Implement producer and consumer applications. Store a list of affiliated partners in the data stream. Send user IDs when the company gives users points.

Key Takeaways

The core challenge is managing a rapidly growing number of subscribers with minimal operational overhead, which points directly to a managed pub/sub service.

This question evaluates the use of Amazon SNS for decoupling systems and scaling asynchronous notifications to a dynamic list of subscribers.

Common mistake: Candidates often choose Kinesis or Lambda-based solutions, failing to recognize that manual iteration over a partner list adds significant complexity compared to native subscription management.

Expert Analysis

Why the Answer Is Correct

Amazon SNS is the ideal solution because it natively supports the publish-subscribe pattern where a single message (user ID) is delivered to multiple endpoints (partners). The requirement for an HTTP endpoint is directly supported by SNS subscriptions, allowing partners to receive notifications without complex integration logic. As noted in the community, this approach handles the scale of 'hundreds of vendors' automatically, requiring zero additional code to manage the fan-out process.

Why the Other Options Are Wrong

Option A requires maintaining a database of partners and writing custom logic in Lambda to iterate through them, which violates the 'least implementation effort' constraint. Option C involves creating a separate task for every partner in Step Functions, which does not scale well and requires significant orchestration setup. Option D uses Kinesis Data Streams, which is designed for high-throughput data ingestion rather than simple notification dispatching, and would require building consumer applications to handle delivery.

Community Comment Notes

Community consensus strongly favors Option B, citing its suitability for 'precisely this kind of use case.' One commenter highlighted that SNS allows subscribing partners via HTTP endpoints, meeting all technical requirements efficiently.

Exam Strategy

When you see requirements for notifying many external parties asynchronously, prioritize managed messaging services like SNS over custom compute or streaming architectures unless specific ordering or replayability is needed.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why not use Kinesis Data Streams for notifications?

Kinesis is built for high-volume data processing pipelines, not simple notifications. It requires custom consumers to read and deliver messages, adding unnecessary development effort.

Can SNS handle hundreds of HTTP subscribers efficiently?

Yes, SNS is designed to scale horizontally and can fan out messages to thousands of subscribers simultaneously with minimal latency and operational overhead.

More SAA-C03 FAQ →

Community Votes

B
100%

100% of anonymous learners picked answer B. Votes are pick records left by other test-takers — they are not the verified answer.

Discussion 6 contributions

Compiled from public community threads and reader submissions, lightly edited for clarity. Handles and vote tallies are shown as recorded, and comments reflect the views of individual contributors.

From public community threads 6

  1. kempes 👍 12 Answered B
    SNS is designed for precisely this kind of use case. It allows you to publish messages to a topic, which can then be delivered to multiple subscribers. Partners can subscribe to the SNS topic using an HTTP endpoint as the protocol, which meets the requirement to notify partners via an HTTP endpoint. This approach is highly scalable and requires the least implementation effort because it leverages managed services without the need for custom logic to manage subscriptions or deliver notifications.
  2. hajra313 👍 8
    Option A involves creating an Amazon Timestream database to store affiliated partners and implementing an AWS Lambda function to read the list and send user IDs to each partner. While this approach can work, it involves more implementation effort than the Amazon SNS solution. It requires setting up and managing a database, as well as configuring the Lambda function to send notifications to partners. The Amazon SNS solution provides a simpler and more scalable approach for rapidly adding partners and notifying them when users receive points. so answer is B
  3. jjcode 👍 2
    The answer is B, create an SNS topic one subscriptions you can make is HTTP, This completely addresses the question objective.
  4. NayeraB 👍 2 Answered B
    This is a perfect SNS use case
  5. Scheldon 👍 1 Answered B
    AnswerB Sending Notification to multiple subscribers = SNS Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) is a managed service that provides message delivery from publishers to subscribers (also known as producers and consumers). Publishers communicate asynchronously with subscribers by sending messages to a topic, which is a logical access point and communication channel. Clients can subscribe to the SNS topic and receive published messages using a supported endpoint type, such as Amazon Data Firehose, Amazon SQS, AWS Lambda, HTTP, email, mobile push notifications, and mobile text messages (SMS). https://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/welcome.html
Show 1 more comment
  1. Andy_09 👍 1
    Option A

Reader comments & corrections

No reader corrections yet — spotted an error or have a note? Share it below.

Log in to comment, report an error, or add a note about this question.

Submitted for moderation before publishing. Keep it helpful and respectful.

S3 Multi-Region Access Point and Replication Strategy

S-grade

Securing NLB with Security Groups for Minimal Change

S-grade

Most Cost-Effective 7-Year Retention for EBS Snapshots?

S-grade

AWS Forecast vs SageMaker for Time-Series Prediction

S-grade

Practice All SAA-C03 Questions

Access 120 questions with complete answers and detailed explanations.

View Full SAA-C03 Practice Test →

← Back to SAA-C03 Study Guide