No, I don't have an easier way, but this method allows you to make a copy of the updated VHD and sysprep and capture the copy, leaving the original all ready to be updated again without running into the activation limit (detailed in this TechNet article), and without needing to wait for your image to deploy in order to update it again next time.
You may also want to check out using the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) for your deployments. MDT allows you to keep the software separate from the image, using task sequences to install the software after Windows is deployed. The benefit to this is that you can change the software in MDT without needing to update your images. MDT can also call WSUS or Windows Update during the deployment to make sure your images are fully updated before the deployment process finishes.
Hope this...
