Web site search not working as expected

According to v11.0.4 release notes, website searches work like this:

"For shoppers searching in the Web site, search results are now returned if they start with the keyword entered by the shopper, including numeric keywords. For example, if a shopper searches using keyword xl135, items xl135, xl13568 and xl135E are returned in the search results."

I have painfully entered all item sku's into the search keywords field so customers could search for sku's. We have over 1000 leather watch bands on our site, all beginning with MS and followed with numbers which describe vendor, size, color, etc. We have about 100+ straps with sku numbers beginning with BA from an older naming system, so I added MS to the search keywords of those items.