Less than a week after unveiling its much anticipated smartphone, Nexus One, Google has introduced a new product called “Near Me Now,” which is a mobile service that makes it fast and easy to learn about your immediate vicinity. It also appears less complicated than other local search applications already in use.

So how does it work? When an Apple iPhone or Android phone lets Google grab its user’s exact location (via the phone’s GPS capabilities), Google adds the “Near Me Now” button to its Web-search interface, automatically making it easy to find local information by creating a minimum of keyboard tapping.

According to Google, they designed this new product to address two user problems. First, Google wanted to make it fast and easy to find out more about a place in your immediate vicinity, whether you’re standing right in front of a business or a short walk away. This can be done by selecting the “Explore right here” option. Second, Google wanted to simplify searching for popular categories of nearby places. For example, let’s just say you’re trying to find a good Italian restaurant, but you don’t see one around. Selecting “Near Me Now” will give you a list of all nearby Italian restaurants. To search all other categories of places not shown, “Browse more categories” provides access to Google’s local search product with more category searches.

We’ve seen similar applications from Yelp, but by concentrating local search to a button on mobile phones’ home-search interfaces, “Near Me Now” is certainly a serious stride in the evolution of mobile search. It will be interesting to see the effect “Near Me Now” will have for Google in the local ad sales arena.