As Lead Writer for Walmart.com’s Electronics Department, in three years I helped it grow over 400%, driving sales from $46 million to $189 million. Out of five sections (Sports, Apparel, Pets, etc.) Electronics was the busiest—so much so that I managed two junior writers. But the department’s steep growth didn’t happen just by working harder.

The situation: all three of us wrote feature/benefits for some 20 items per day. Even that was not enough to keep up with Electronics’ slew of products to post. The Head of Editorial asked me to devise a better system. The insight: I realized much of what we wrote would be needed again soon for a similar item.

In brief, the Phrase Library consisted of saving and filing specific effective phrases we’d written. For example, saying With a 4x zoom you’ll get candid shots, especially of children who don’t realize you’re filming them. With any particular product category—here, Camcorders—we now had 25 sentences, proofed and available in moments. The Phrase Library boosted productivity by 30%, and Marketing asked me to show other sections how to make one.