Possible Duplicate:
Do meta keywords have any impact on ranking algorithms?

I am fairly new to the whole Webmaster Tools concept. I have been looking at all the different options, such as crawl errors, HTML improvements etc...

I have been looking at the Duplicate Meta Descriptions and Short Meta Descriptions, was wondering if anyone could suggest ideas on how to go about improving this. It seems that all the Duplicates are from the URL Title and the short description. It would seem to me that most people would have information regarding the page with the same keywords as their titles.

Heres an example of one:

These are the ultimate hampers in taste, quality and value. Amongst this range of luxury hampers ar

    /food-hampers/food-hampers-over-100.html

    /thank-you-gifts/large-gifts-over-100.html

To get to the point I just want to know do these things really matter? Would they have a real consequence on my sites rankings?

My sites have been falling down the rankings since early this year and I have really started to look at Google Analytics and Webmaster tools to try and indicate certain problems.

I have researched the Internet and it seems that some people don't bother and others do!!

I know that Stackoverflow has 100s+ people who have went through the above and I would really appricate if they could give me some tips etc.

Or in the END does it really matter??

:D