one or more computer processors identify words in a natural language query that have previously - established associations with stored data upon which the query will be executed . the natural language query is formatted to a query template that includes at least one first component and at least one second component . one or more computer processors modify the at least one first component of the a query template based on at least one link between the one or more words in the natural language query and the at least one first component . one or more computer processors generate a new query by adding one or more values to the query template . the one or more values are added to the query template based on the modification of the at least one first component . one or more computer processors execute a search based on the new query .