AI vs. Human Expertise: Striking the Right Balance in Localization
AI-based tools are reinventing the way industries operate. From small eCommerce businesses to large B2B enterprises, everyone is coming around to the new reality. But is it a good idea to forgo all human contribution? The simple answer is "no." While AI is now an integral part of the way you run your business, human expertise is what keeps it competitive. Everyone has access to AI, but only a few companies have top-notch human experts. AI in localization is only one part of the equation.
When it comes to localization, striking the right balance can be especially hard. The appeal of cheap and fast AI is too strong to ignore. Thankfully, there is a way to get the best of both worlds.
AI In Localization: What It Can Do
AI localization is the process of integrating artificial intelligence into your localization process. Besides direct machine translations, AI tools can take some steps towards adapting the content to the needs of different cultures. These tools use advanced machine learning algorithms and natural language processing (NLP) to achieve the desired results.
Besides executing translation and localization tasks, AI-based tools can help manage localization projects. They automate repetitive tasks and even provide insights that work well for predictive analytics.
Combining all these capabilities gives you a cost-effective method of adapting your content to various target audiences.
In short, what AI can usually do is:
Translate the content
Adapt it to cultural needs
Automate localization
While this sounds like a perfect way to save time and money, AI-driven tools still cannot produce top-quality results. The content they create is rarely ready for publishing. In 99% of cases, it requires a human review.
What AI Can't Do for Localization
The common misconception about AI is that it can create great translation quality on its own. While these tools have access to large language databases and produce strong results, many nuances are still missing.
In many translations, the ability to catch the tone of voice and decipher idiomatic expressions is crucial to creating the right translation. When it comes to localization, this requirement is even more acute.
Produce Good Results With Low-Resource Languages
LLMs require access to a significant volume of training data to localize content. While there are large databases for such common languages as English or Spanish, information for many others is not as in-depth.
Trying to localize translations for languages like Swahili or Hebrew could lead to multiple issues. Meanwhile, even more widely used languages like Polish or Italian may not be as easy to translate perfectly.
This may change with time as tools using AI in localization receive more training data. However, anything that falls outside the top spoken languages may contain multiple errors.
Check Localized Content Quality
Low-quality localization has a direct impact on user experience. Something that may sound perfectly standard in English could offend a person's feelings in Japanese. Besides direct translations and simple transitions to and from the metric system, cultural traditions must be taken into account.
Only human expertise can tackle this issue. Without an expert, the localization result can significantly harm your sales and marketing campaign or, worse, the company's reputation.
Combining Human Expertise and AI in Localization
The emergence of AI made relying fully on human expertise ineffective and costly. That's one of the reasons why, by 2030, more than 21% of work hours in the U.S. economy are likely to be made obsolete by AI automation.
While many companies have high hopes for AI replacing human experts right this moment, the reality is completely different. AI will not replace human expertise in localization. AI, coupled with human expertise, will prove to be the winning combination.
Taking full advantage of this tandem requires some reinvention of the tried-and-tested localization process.
The Future of Localization
AI-driven tools are an integral part of the future of localization. As they receive more and more training, these programs can become much more useful. With time, they may be able to replace human experts. However, a full transition to AI in localization is unlikely to happen immediately.
The near future of localization is the collaboration of AI and humans. Companies that learn to leverage this tandem effectively will stay ahead of the competition.
Getting Closer to the Right AI-Human Balance in Localization
The perfect balance of AI-human collaboration in localization isn't easy to reach. Relying too much on one or the other could affect either content quality or cost efficiency. Outsourcing localization to a team of experts with the right AI tools could be the best decision.
At Vistatec, we have significant experience implementing AI into our localization efforts. We leverage the best of automation to speed up and enhance the localization process for our clients. Our translation and localization experts take care of the rest. For more information about our capabilities, contact our team at any time.
