How to Search Silver Anvils Online
Basic Searches
Using the drop-down menus, you can search award winning entries by Date, Category or Industry. You can also combine a Date search with a Category and/or Industry search. To combine Date, Category and/or Industry, make sure that AND is selected in the drop-down menu to the right of the field.
To start your search, click the Submit Query button.
To clear the box, open the list again and select the blank line at the very top of the list.
Advanced Searches
Using the Enter any word or phrase field you can locate very specific information. For example, you can identify campaigns by agency, company, product, spokesperson or venue by simply typing the word or phrase of interest.
Type the word you want to find (highway) or type a phrase (habitat for humanity) to find those words, in that order. To find variations of word stems, type an asterisk at the end of one or more words (comput* tech*).
To combine words or phrases, use the symbols & to represent AND. To find entries that discuss both poverty and homelessness, type (poverty & homeless*).
Use the symbol / to represent OR. To find entries that discuss poverty or homelessness, type (poverty / homeless*).
Use the symbol ! to represent NOT. See examples below.
Use the proximity operators w# (within) and p# (preceding) to find words near each other. See examples below.
| Type this… | To find… |
| sales meeting | a phrase (those words, in that order) |
| sales / marketing | either word (or both) |
| sales & marketing | items that contain both words (items that contain just one of the words will be ignored) |
| health policy ! medical benefit* | "health policy" but not "medical benefits" |
| sales p5 market* | "sales" preceding "marketing" by 5 words or fewer. You can include an asterisk at the end of either word. Do not string together phrases (clinton w5 white house). |
| sales w5 marketing | "sales" within 5 words of "marketing" (before or after). Do not include phrases. |
Words joined by & / ! are evaluated in left-to-right order: red & white / blue finds items that are red and white, or items that are blue. Use parentheses to control evaluation order: red & (white / blue) finds items that are red and white or red and blue.
Case and Punctuation
Case is usually ignored (a search for joe smith finds Joe Smith). Punctuation is also ignored, except for the and-or-not symbols (& / !). If you want these characters to be interpreted literally, use quotation marks ("Smith & Wesson") or replace the punctuation with a space (Smith Wesson).
Other Questions about searching the database…contact PRSA's Professional Resources Center at 212-460-1459 or email resources@prsa.org.