What is meta data?

What is metadata?

Good question. Let’s use a pretty meta example.

I typed into Google “What is a meta description?” and here’s one of the first search results that comes up:

The first line, in big blue print, is the meta title. It's also known as the title tag.

The two lines below the title, appearing on SERPs, is the meta description. This is essentially a concise, relevant summary of what the piece is about. It doesn't appear in the content itself, just on the SERPs.