diff --git a/lib/broadway_rabbitmq/producer.ex b/lib/broadway_rabbitmq/producer.ex
index ec03748..7d4369c 100644
--- a/lib/broadway_rabbitmq/producer.ex
+++ b/lib/broadway_rabbitmq/producer.ex
@@ -376,56 +376,121 @@ defmodule BroadwayRabbitMQ.Producer do
 
   ## Dead-letter Exchanges
 
-  Here's an example of how to use a dead-letter exchange setup with broadway_rabbitmq:
+  Dead-letter exchanges are normal RabbitMQ exchanges designated for receiving messages
+  that have been rejected elsewhere.  You can reference a dead-letter exchange when
+  defining a queue by supplying a `"x-dead-letter-exchange"` argument and optionally a
+  `"x-dead-letter-routing-key"`. When a queue has a dead-letter exchange defined, then
+  failing a message with `Broadway.Message.failed/2` or raising an exception in `c:Broadway.handle_message/3`
+  causes the message to be republished to the exchange named in the `"x-dead-letter-exchange"`
+  argument. The message's original routing key is kept unless the `"x-dead-letter-routing-key"`
+  argument specifies an override.
+
+  A bit more care is needed during setup when using dead-letter exchanges because the dead-letter
+  exchange must be declared and exist *before* you attempt to reference it when declaring a queue.
+  For this reason, you may need to take additional steps when setting up your RabbitMQ instance
+  beyond what is available to you in the `:after_connect` option.
+
+  You can declare your exchanges and queues in a `Mix` task or before your application starts:
+
+      {:ok, connection} = AMQP.Connection.open()
+      {:ok, channel} = AMQP.Channel.open(connection)
+
+      # Declare exchanges
+      :ok = AMQP.Exchange.declare(channel, "my_exchange", :fanout, durable: true)
+      :ok = AMQP.Exchange.declare(channel, "my_exchange.dlx", :fanout, durable: true)
+
+      # Define and bind queues within the exchange depending on your needs
+      {:ok, _} = AMQP.Queue.declare(channel, "my_queue.dlx", durable: true)
+      :ok = AMQP.Queue.bind(channel, "my_queue.dlx", "my_exchange.dlx", [])
+
+      {:ok, _} =
+        AMQP.Queue.declare(channel, "my_queue",
+          durable: true,
+          arguments: [
+            {"x-dead-letter-exchange", :longstr, "my_exchange.dlx"},
+            {"x-dead-letter-routing-key", :longstr, "my_queue.dlx"}
+          ]
+        )
+
+      :ok = AMQP.Queue.bind(channel, "my_queue", "my_exchange", [])
+
+  Once you have your exchanges and queues declared, you can start Broadway pipelines
+  to consume messages in the queues. For a thorough example, we need one pipeline which
+  will fail messages and another pipeline to consume messages from the dead-letter exchange.
+
+  In this example, `MyPipeline` represents the primary pipeline which may reject/fail
+  messages:
 
       defmodule MyPipeline do
         use Broadway
 
+        require Logger
+
         @queue "my_queue"
-        @exchange "my_exchange"
-        @queue_dlx "my_queue.dlx"
-        @exchange_dlx "my_exchange.dlx"
 
         def start_link(_opts) do
           Broadway.start_link(__MODULE__,
             name: __MODULE__,
             producer: [
-              module: {
-                BroadwayRabbitMQ.Producer,
-                on_failure: :reject,
-                after_connect: &declare_rabbitmq_topology/1,
-                queue: @queue,
-                declare: [
-                  durable: true,
-                  arguments: [
-                    {"x-dead-letter-exchange", :longstr, @exchange_dlx},
-                    {"x-dead-letter-routing-key", :longstr, @queue_dlx}
-                  ]
-                ],
-                bindings: [{@exchange, []}],
-              },
+              module: {BroadwayRabbitMQ.Producer, on_failure: :reject, queue: @queue},
               concurrency: 2
             ],
             processors: [default: [concurrency: 4]]
           )
         end
 
-        defp declare_rabbitmq_topology(amqp_channel) do
-          with :ok <- AMQP.Exchange.declare(amqp_channel, @exchange, :fanout, durable: true),
-               :ok <- AMQP.Exchange.declare(amqp_channel, @exchange_dlx, :fanout, durable: true),
-               {:ok, _} <- AMQP.Queue.declare(amqp_channel, @queue_dlx, durable: true),
-               :ok <- AMQP.Queue.bind(amqp_channel, @queue_dlx, @exchange_dlx) do
-            :ok
-          end
+        @impl true
+        def handle_message(_processor, message, _context) do
+          # Raising errors or returning a "failed" message here sends the message to the
+          # dead-letter queue, e.g.
+          Logger.debug("Failing message; this should republish to the dead-letter exchange")
+
+          Broadway.Message.failed(
+            message,
+            "Failing a message triggers republication to the dead-letter exchange"
+          )
+        end
+      end
+
+  In order to see the message forwarding in action, we can spin up another pipeline that
+  consumes messages from the `my_queue.dlx` queue:
+
+      defmodule DeadPipeline do
+        use Broadway
+        require Logger
+
+        @queue_dlx "my_queue.dlx"
+
+        def start_link(_opts) do
+          Broadway.start_link(__MODULE__,
+            name: __MODULE__,
+            producer: [
+              module: {BroadwayRabbitMQ.Producer, on_failure: :reject, queue: @queue_dlx},
+              concurrency: 2
+            ],
+            processors: [default: [concurrency: 4]]
+          )
         end
 
         @impl true
         def handle_message(_processor, message, _context) do
-          # Raising errors or returning a "failed" message here sends the message to the
-          # dead-letter queue.
+          Logger.debug("Dead letter message received!")
+          message
         end
       end
 
+
+  To test out the dead-letter republishing behavior, try publishing a message into your
+  primary exchange and observe that it gets republished and consumed by the queue in the
+  dead-letter exchange:
+
+        iex> {:ok, connection} = AMQP.Connection.open()
+        iex> {:ok, channel} = AMQP.Channel.open(connection)
+        iex> AMQP.Basic.publish(channel, "my_exchange", "my_queue", "Am I dead?")
+        :ok
+        [debug] Failing message; this should republish to the dead-letter exchange
+        [debug] Dead letter message received!
+
   """
 
   use GenStage