Further consolidating the products (or at least their names) in the local and mobile space, Google has re-named Boost as AdWords Express, also stepping up marketing efforts and consolidating sign-up for Express and Google Places.

“We’ve seen great success with the product, but we want to change the product name to better emphasize the ties to the main AdWords product,” said Kiley McEvoy, the product manager for AdWords Express.

McEvoy told me that the company had “tens of thousands” of advertisers using what’s now called AdWords Express. The product was first announced, and introduced to a small group of advertisers, last October. It was then rolled out to the whole of the U.S., and to mobile devices, in January.

Now, the product will be called AdWords Express, and Google has also made it easier for advertisers to sign up. Previously, one needed to be a Places user first, to be offered a chance to use AdWords Express. Now, the company has changed the user flow so that folks can sign up for both products at the same time. Google has set up a new landing page at google.com/awexpress

The idea behind AdWords Express is that local businesses, who, at one time, only needed to place a yellow pages ad once a year, have been frightened away from AdWords by the perceived complexity of keywords, bidding, etc. With Express, they input a bit of information about their company, set a budget, write a couple of lines of ad copy, and Google handles the keywords and bidding. The ads themselves look similar to AdWords Local Extensions ads. Here’s a video the company has released as part of its new marketing push:

The renaming continues a trend toward Google’s consolidation of its brands in the local and mobile space. Since Marissa Mayer told a SXSW audience in March that Google had “too many products,” in the area, Google has shed the Hotpot brand and folded the ratings and review experience into the local Place page.

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Google: Maps & Local | Google: Mobile

About The Author: Pamela Parker is a contributing editor for Search Engine Land and Executive Features Editor at Marketing Land. She’s a well-respected authority on digital marketing, having reported and written on the subject since 1998, including a stint as managing editor of ClickZ. She’s also worked to help monetize independent publishers’ sites at Federated Media Publishing. She blogs about media and marketing at The River and about cooking, gardening and parenthood at Free Range. She can be found on Twitter as @pamelaparker. See more articles by Pamela Parker

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