The name "Google AdWords" has been deprecated for several years. You do still hear google-adwords or just plain adwords every so often tho - mostly out of habit. Those could become synonyms.
Google has also replaced it everywhere (subdomain, logo)
This reminds me of when Google changed Google Webmaster Tools to Google Search Console back in 2015...
We decided back then to wait a while to see how our community was referring to it, and to also compare the two using Google Trends. After about a year and a half, it became clear from both that google-search-console was being used more than google-webmaster-tools, so we made google-search-console the canonical tag and google-webmaster-tools a synonym of that.
Using that as a precedence, we could compare Google Ads with Google AdWords using Google Trends again, which indicates here that Google Ads is the much more dominant of the two. Currently we don't have a google-ads tag yet, but the tag wiki for google-adwords already states: "Now referred to as "Google Ads". Therefore we really can't compare the tag usage like we did previously.
I think it's good if our site keeps up-to-date with terminology though so we don't appear outdated, and in this case, the name change occurred over three years ago.
Therefore, I think we should create a google-ads tag, and make google-adwords (and its synonym adwords) a synonym of the canonical google-ads tag. When a user types in google-adwords, the google-ads tag will then automatically be populated for them to select. The tag wiki for google-ads should also note that it was previously referred to as "Google AdWords".
To differentiate google-ads from google-adsense, we'll also edit the two tag wikis to note that Google AdSense is for publishers and the Google Ads program is for advertisers, along with other relevant distinctions.
With the consensus of the community, I'll make the above changes and update this answer with details for the tag wikis too.
Update:
(As per the discussion in the comments under the question)
It appears we're not gaining much of a consensus, other than the original tag (google-adwords) should be renamed to better match Google's current naming. I suggest we use the name of Google's product as is (google-ads) for now since it doesn't exist as a tag yet, and if there's any apparent confusion later, we can always revisit this discussion and rename it to something else then. With more mods than in-coming questions on some days, it shouldn't be hard to monitor that.
Update 2:
A google-ads tag and tag wiki were created, which states (primarily from Wikipedia):
(Formerly known as "Google AdWords", and different from "Google AdSense") Google Ads is an online advertising platform offered by Google, where advertisers bid to display brief advertisements, service offerings, product listings, or videos to web users. It can place ads both in the results of search engines like Google Search, and on non-search websites, mobile apps, and videos. Services are offered under a pay-per-click (PPC) pricing model.
The google-adwords tag is now a synonym of the google-ads tag, and all of the questions tagged with google-adwords have been updated to google-ads instead.
The google-adsense tag wiki was also updated to:
(Different from "Google Ads") Google AdSense is a program run by Google through which website publishers in the Google Network of content sites serve text, images, video, or interactive media advertisements that are targeted to the site content and audience.
Lastly, the adwords-value-track tag was also made a synonym of a newly created google-ads-valuetrack tag, and a tag wiki for that was created.
google-ads gets a 4th-level fireball spell cast on them centered on their position? Judging from experience, not everyone reads excerpts, even if you put all-caps letters at the beginning saying "DO NOT USE THIS FOR ADSENSE QUESTIONS". I'm getting flashbacks to when I tried removing a duplicate tag on Stack Overflow and during the rolling 24hr grace period, Users. Just. Kept. Re-creating the tag. Even when the tag excerpt said "DO NOT USE THIS TAG, USE [OTHER TAG]."
google-ads-for-advertisers and google-adsense-for-publishers, as defined by Google here, but I don't really think that's necessary. If Google's users know the difference, they should here as well - they typically know what product they're asking about. I think this is just one of those things we have to chalk-up as a change that we're not ecstatic about (like removing "webmasters" from their search tools), but unfortunately have to conform to their naming since it's their products.
google-ads-for-advertisers and google-adsense-for-publishers though I worry it makes the tags too long, and that they become a tad verbose.
Oct 12, 2021 at 16:59
I'm pleased to see that this question has stimulated so much discussion. Stephen mentioned something that got me thinking:
If somebody says "Google Ads" to me I assume they are talking about Adsense.
This is interesting (and quite valuable). The key distinction between Google Ads and Google AdSense is that Google Ads is a platform for Pay-Per-Click advertising (colloquially "PPC"), and AdSense is a platform for Programmatic advertising (colloquially "Display Ads").
That being said, I notice that we do not have tags for either PPC or Display Ads (which are very different things) - I consider these to be of the same type as "SEO", which we do have a tag for.
I think Dan makes a great point about precedent, and I'm personally in favor if his original proposal both because I think that google-ads makes logical sense AND follows historical precedent (yet, all ideas have been great tho). That said, I'd like to take a second to build on this.
I think there is a good argument to be made for the addition of ppc or pay-per-click and display-advertising or display ads to fill the aforementioned gap. That covers both forms broadly. The question then becomes, how should a user add specificity?
Could it be the case that simply adding the "Google" tag along side solve the problem? I ask this because Bing and other big tech also have ads platforms (e.g. Pinterest, Wayfair, Etsy). This approach would future proof the taxonomy for additional types, but it opens up the possibility to confusion; usage would have to be communicated very well. I think it's too error prone, and generally makes less sense.
Alternatively, the addition of these top level tags might not change things - to me they're not mutually exclusive. We could go with Dan's proposal to add google-ads yet also add ppc and display ads.
The tagging of a question about Google Ads would look like this:
ppc google-ads
And the tagging of a question about AdSense would look like this:
display-ads google-adsense
This would control for future additions as well. google-adwords naturally still becomes synonymous with the new canonical - there's also the (unused) adwords tag, which seems like a clear candidate for deletion regardless.
google + ppc), things can get lost in translation. And ppc + google-ads doesn't really address (my perceived) issue, which is that users are likely to misuse the google-ads tag for adsense. On a separate note, I think a ppc tag is overly narrow, as at face value it seemingly excludes algorithmic ads that are metered by other means, like price-per-mille or other more exotic pricing.
pay-per-click would help. PPC is a a pricing model. It doesn't imply that ads are purchased or that ads are displayed on a site, only that the payment is per click as opposed to by action or impression. Similarly for display-ads, you can buy display ads, or you can put display ads on your site.
google-adsense ppc if you wanted to talk about getting paid per click from Google AdSense.
display-ads tho, display and PPC are seen as different things. So your tag example would not make sense. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) – Paid links are shown on search engines and are ranked according to a variety of factors including but not limited to bid, keyword, landing page, and age of account with search engine. Display ads – Paid advertisements are shown on websites based on a specific theme of keywords that are matched to the hosting website’s topic. Display can be text, image, and video ads.
Oct 13, 2021 at 13:07
I agree that google-adwords should be retired, but replacing it by google-ads would be a mistake. If somebody says "Google Ads" to me I assume they are talking about Adsense. This new name is very ambiguous. I worry that if we rename the tag to google-ads will be added to Adsense questions. We have more than 100 questions tagged "adsense" that use the phrase "google ads".
I like Dan's suggestion of google-ads-for-advertisers for the new tag.
I don't think it would be necessary to rename the Adsense tag to google-adsense-for-publishers at the same time.
google-ads-for-advertisers. And adsense can stay adsense.
google-ads-for-advertisersin a comment. I like that and put it into an answer.google-adwords) should be renamed to better match Google's naming. I suggest we use the name of Google's product as is (google-ads) for now since it doesn't exist as a tag yet, and if there's any apparent confusion later, we can always revisit this discussion and rename it to something else then. With more mods than in-coming questions on some days, it shouldn't be hard to monitor that.google-ads, then come back and discuss again if it does end up getting misused.