Brandkit Search Tip and Tricks - using secret searchbox operators

Did you know that the standard Brandkit searchbox hides some handy tricks to help you find Assets? Using some simple syntax changes allows you to get more accurate and more explicit search results.

• Find a contiguous string by wrapping your search phrase in quotes (“xyz”)
• Use a NOT operator to exclude some Assets from your search results.
• Use an OR operator to expand your search results.

A contiguous string

Normally when searching for a multi-word search phrase, Brandkit looks for any Asset that has either word in it’s metadata.

e.g. Searching for Stirling Castle will find all Assets with either Stirling or Castle in it’s metadata. Example below:

Wrapping a search phrase in quotes (“xyz”) asks the search to find a contiguous string - which just means we’re looking for the whole phrase as written rather than individual words.

So a search for “Stirling Castle” looks for any Asset that has the whole string “Stirling Castle” with words in the same order as written. You should expect fewer results typically than the previous search (without quotes). Example below:

NOT operator

You can search for Assets using one phrase e.g. Doune Castle, which might return images of Doune Castle featuring both images with and without people.

However you might want only images without people, so you can simply add “- people“ to your search phrase (as see below) to find all Assets with metadata matching the string “Doune Castle” but excluding any Assets with the string “People:” found in the metadata of those Assets. Example below:

Note that this NOT exclusion would only work if Assets are tagged with People or have the string “people” elsewhere in the metadata (e.g. Name, Description, etc)

OR operator

Normally when you search for two things (two search phrases, two tags etc), the Search result is smaller - that is the second phrase refines the results of the first because the search result shows Assets that have both Phrases or Tags present. This is what is know as an AND search and is the standard way search works in Brandkit.

That is every new phrase or filter added refines the search result. Example below:

Enter the OR search. OR is the opposite of AND and looks for Asset that have either or any of the Search Phrases or Filter values. In this way every new phrase added expands the search results. Example below.

When using standard Search Filters (i.e. the dropdowns under the searchbox), adding an OR operator for any Filter is as simple as selecting multiple options in a Filter drop down (e.g. Orientation), but this does not apply to tags, asset title, description, and some other metadata fields.

When searching use a search phrase/tag, etc , and you want to expand the possible Search Results to include Assets matching multiple search phrases (e.g. Assets matching either Doune Castle or Stirling Castle), you’ll need to use the OR operator.

All you need to do is add the word OR between search phrases. Example below.

Simple as that.

Enjoy :)