This is an aspect that should be reflected upon quite early on in the publishing process. Metadata in the context of an article are the words you use to describe your article and its content. Most databases usually apply some sort of relevance ranking for search results. When someone search for articles based on keywords the relevance ranking would place articles which match those keywords first in the search results list if they are found in more prominent places of an article. Those prominent places are:
You should therefore take some time to create a good title, write an abstract that covers the topics of the article (of course), keeping in mind that you should include words that a potential reader of your article might search for in order to find an article like yours. The same goes for the keywords. This is sometimes called Search engine optimization or SEO:
Increasing visibility and discoverability of scholarly publications with academic search engine optimization (Insights: the UKSG journal)
Maximising the Exposure of Your Research: Search Engine Optimisation and why it matters (Methods.blog)
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for your article (Wiley)
Selecting Keyword for your Manuscript (Nurse Author & Editor)
Choosing Keywords (JMIR Publications)
