I spent a lot of years as a copywriter. I wrote ads, brochure copy, website content, direct mail campaigns and developed a host of other marketing materials that informed, enticed and invited potential customers to notice the client company and its services and/or products.

When I first started, I agonized over what to say and how to say it. I met with the client, took notes and spent countless hours – days even – investing “think time” to craft just the right mix of words to represent the company to its audience.

It wasn’t until I was assigned to a creative team, led by a project manager who was a former (and in demand) copywriter for Fortune 100 companies, that I learned the secret to writing copy quickly, in the client’s voice, and on target with the audience. Here is what I observed—and learned—in that one, single meeting:

Our small creative team, made up of the project manager, copywriter, and graphic designer, met with the client. Our client was a banking institution that was merging with another and our task was to create a series of three tri-fold brochures to announce the merger and promote its added banking products.

The PM recorded the discussion, asked questions, took notes and about two hours later we left the client’s office and reconvened at a coffee shop to discuss the next steps. The PM handed me his single sheet of paper with about 15 handwritten phrases on it. “These are your probable heads and subheads,” he said. “Listen to the tape and fill in the content. The client gave us everything we need.”

That day I learned a new way of working with clients to give them exactly what they want. I also realized for the first time that my job wasn’t so much about creating something new as it was about asking the right questions and framing the answers in a creative way—using the clients’ own words. For example, in conversation the client had said, “It’s tough stuff for our customers to understand but we make it easy using simplified forms.” The headline of the brochure became, “Tough Stuff Made Easy.” The graphic was of the bank’s simplified form. The features and benefits were packaged into a simple idea the client had given us.

From that day forward I changed my perspective and my process and, after trying this new approach on several projects, I was able to increase my value to a client. Suddenly I was delivering exactly what the client expected, often going from first draft to final with very minor (if any) tweaks. I now understood and could apply the old adage, “working smarter not harder” to my projects.

If you are still fumbling around to come up with the right words and investing too much “think time” to deliver on-target assignments, do what I do:

• Ask questions that a reader or prospect would ask about the product or service.
• Listen to the answers given by the client and note the phrases that the client keeps repeating.
• Record the sessions using a small digital recorder that plugs directly into a USB port for playback; this gives you a one-step transfer of the file.
• Use the client’s own words in your copy—imbedded in the discussion are headlines, subheads, benefits and supporting features. The tone is set by the client – this is how they speak to customers and potential customers – what could be more natural than that for their promotional materials?

What used to take me days to write, now took me hours… without reducing prices. The PM helped me realize that I was being paid for expertise, not for time. Even though 70% of the content written came from the client, I was the one who knew how to extract and enhance it for the reading audience. When you stop thinking like an employee who trades time for dollars, and start thinking like a professional who offers solutions to a problem, you won’t feel guilty for charging decent fees for your expertise.

I use this same process for ghostwriting books, eBooks – anything I write on behalf of someone else. You’ll get it done faster, you’ll get it done more accurately, and you’ll build a reputation for listening to and delivering on your client’s needs and directives.