How to order by first name (SQL) in an exploded string - php

Question

I have the following code to search for a name in a field that has all three name so I have been forced to explode the string for better results as follows
$search_terms = explode(" ", $key);
$count = count($search_terms);
$tick= 0;
$query = "";
for($i = 0; $i < $count; $i++) {
$tick++;
$query .= "SELECT * ";
$query .= "FROM agents ";
$query .= "WHERE names ";
$query .= "LIKE '%".$search_terms[$i]."%' ";
$query .= "OR company LIKE '%".$search_terms[$i]."%' ";
if($tick != $count)
$query .= " UNION ";
}
$query .="ORDER BY names ASC ";
The problem is that once a search query such as Lawrence Gabriel and my database does indeed have Lawrence Gabriel but also Edward Gabriel, I will get the Edward result listed before Lawrence.
I'd like to have all 'Gabriels', so to speak, listed but for my results to be ordered by the first name typed into the search box. This would have been easier if first name, second name were in individual columns.
How can I achieve the desired result?

Answer 1

try this
ORDER BY SUBSTRING_INDEX(names, ' ', 1) ASC
this will order by the first name before the space
Demo
you can use it like that also:
SELECT id, names, SUBSTRING_INDEX(names, ' ', 1) name
FROM agents
WHERE names
LIKE '%".$search_terms[$i]."%'
OR company LIKE '%".$search_terms[$i]."%'
ORDER BY name asc
DEMO