linktree-prod-checklist

Linktree Production Checklist

Overview

Linktree profiles serve as the single gateway between a creator's social audience and their monetized destinations. A misconfigured integration can silently drop link-click analytics, leak API keys through client-side calls, or trip the 100 req/min rate limit during viral traffic spikes. This checklist hardens your Linktree API integration for production-grade reliability, ensuring click tracking stays accurate, webhook delivery remains verified, and your link-in-bio pages load under high concurrency.

Prerequisites

• Production Linktree API key (not sandbox/dev key)
• Secrets manager configured (Vault, AWS Secrets Manager, or GCP Secret Manager)
• Monitoring stack operational (Datadog, Grafana, or CloudWatch)
• Staging environment validated with synthetic traffic test

Authentication & Secrets

• API keys stored in vault/secrets manager (never in code or environment files)
• Key rotation schedule configured (every 90 days)
• Separate keys for staging vs production environments
• Bearer token included in Authorization header, not query params
• API key scopes restricted to minimum required permissions (read-only where possible)

API Integration

• Base URL points to https://api.linktr.ee/v1 (production, not sandbox)
• Rate limiting enforced client-side at 90 req/min (buffer below 100 req/min hard limit)
• Pagination implemented for profile link listing (cursor-based, not offset)
• Request timeout set to 10 seconds for profile reads, 30 seconds for analytics queries
• Content-Type: application/json and Accept headers set on every request
• Link click tracking webhook endpoint registered and reachable from Linktree servers
• Bulk link updates batched to avoid rate limit bursts during campaign launches

Error Handling & Resilience

• Circuit breaker configured for Linktree API calls (open after 5 consecutive failures)
• Retry logic with exponential backoff for 429 (rate limit) and 5xx responses
• 429 responses parse Retry-After header to schedule next attempt
• Graceful degradation serves cached profile data when API is unreachable
• Link click events queued locally during outages and replayed on recovery
• Timeout errors distinguished from authentication errors in alerting

Monitoring & Alerting

• API latency tracked (p50, p95, p99) with 500ms p95 threshold
• Error rate alerts configured (threshold: >1% over 5-minute window)
• Rate limit headroom monitored (alert when usage exceeds 80 req/min sustained)
• Click tracking event delivery lag measured (alert if >60s behind real-time)
• Profile cache hit ratio tracked (target: >90% for high-traffic creators)
• Webhook delivery failures logged with payload for manual replay

Security

• Webhook signatures verified using HMAC-SHA256 with shared secret
• CORS restricted to known frontend domains (no wildcard origins)
• API responses sanitized before rendering user-generated link titles/descriptions
• Click analytics data access restricted by creator account scope
• No PII logged in plain text (creator emails, visitor IPs masked)

Validation Script

async function validateLinktreeProduction(apiKey: string): Promise<void> {
  const base = 'https://api.linktr.ee/v1';
  const headers = { Authorization: `Bearer ${apiKey}`, 'Content-Type': 'application/json' };

  // 1. Connectivity check
  const ping = await fetch(`${base}/health`, { headers, signal: AbortSignal.timeout(5000) });
  console.assert(ping.ok, `API unreachable: ${ping.status}`);

  // 2. Auth validation
  const profile = await fetch(`${base}/me`, { headers });
  console.assert(profile.status !== 401, 'Invalid API key');
  console.assert(profile.status !== 403, 'Insufficient key permissions');

  // 3. Rate limit headroom
  const remaining = parseInt(profile.headers.get('X-RateLimit-Remaining') ?? '0');
  console.assert(remaining > 20, `Rate limit headroom low: ${remaining} remaining`);

  // 4. Webhook endpoint reachable
  const webhookUrl = process.env.LINKTREE_WEBHOOK_URL;
  if (webhookUrl) {
    const wh = await fetch(webhookUrl, { method: 'HEAD', signal: AbortSignal.timeout(5000) });
    console.assert(wh.ok, `Webhook endpoint unreachable: ${wh.status}`);
  }

  // 5. Click tracking active
  const links = await fetch(`${base}/links`, { headers });
  console.assert(links.ok, `Links endpoint failed: ${links.status}`);
  console.log('All Linktree production checks passed');
}

Risk Matrix

Check	Risk if Skipped	Priority
HMAC webhook verification	Spoofed click events corrupt analytics	Critical
Rate limit client-side cap	429 storm during viral spikes, data loss	Critical
Bearer token in vault	Key leak via repo/logs, full account takeover	Critical
Cached profile fallback	Blank link-in-bio page during outage	High
Click event replay queue	Permanent analytics gaps after transient failures	High

Resources

• Linktree Developer Docs

Next Steps

See linktree-security-basics.