What is AI Localization? And Should You DIY or Outsource?

AI localization is transforming how video content reaches global audiences. By utilizing innovative translation technologies, creators can now adapt content faster and more affordably than ever before.

When it comes to localization services like subtitling and dubbing, AI solutions are everywhere, even on platforms like YouTube, which offer free options for content creators seeking global reach. But when quality, nuance, and scale matter, the decision to build or outsource your AI localization workflow becomes critical.

So, what exactly is AI localization, and how should you implement it? Read on to learn the answer to these pertinent questions.

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What is AI Localization?

Before diving into the definition of AI localization, it is important to understand what localization is, generally speaking. Localization is the process of adapting content for a specific language, culture, and audience.
It goes beyond direct translation to account for local customs, idioms, cultural references, legal requirements, and viewer expectations. For video content, localization typically involves subtitling, dubbing, on-screen text translation, and even global language audio description to ensure the message is accessible and resonates in each target market.
AI localization, then, is the application of artificial intelligence to automate and enhance this process.

 

 

 

Benefits of AI Localization

AI localization offers a range of advantages for organizations looking to expand their video content to global markets quickly and efficiently. While it’s not a substitute for human creativity and cultural expertise, AI brings significant value when integrated thoughtfully into the localization workflow:

• Faster Turnaround Times – AI tools can transcribe, translate, and generate voiceovers or subtitles in a fraction of the time it would take a human team, drastically reducing production timelines.
• Lower Costs – Automating parts of the localization process helps cut costs by minimizing manual labor and reducing the need for large in-house teams.
• Improved Scalability – Whether you’re localizing ten videos or ten thousand, AI enables consistent output and makes it easier to scale your content across multiple languages and regions.
• Consistent Quality – AI systems can be trained to maintain terminology, tone, and style across all localized assets, ensuring consistency in your brand voice.
• Seamless Workflow Integration – Many AI localization solutions are built to integrate with existing media platforms making it easier to manage content across production, translation, and distribution pipelines.

When paired with human oversight and quality control, AI localization provides a powerful, flexible solution for meeting the demands of multilingual video content at scale.

 

Build vs. Buy: Should You Build Your AI Localization Workflow?

While AI video localization tools may appear effortless, producing high-quality localized video at scale requires a combination of AI tools and the expertise of professional linguists. Hidden costs include:

• Assembling a skilled team, typically involving AI experts, developers, linguists, and project managers.
• Identifying and selecting areas of AI integrations such as machine translation, quality assurance, and workflow automation.
• Training and fine-tuning AI models regularly to meet your organization’s specific needs and terminology.
• Establishing human oversight and feedback loops to continuously improve the performance of AI models and quality check final outputs.
• Measuring AI localization workflows with defined KPIs to track the impact of AI.
• Upgrading models when new technologies emerge or updates are necessary.
• Security and compliance.

 

How to Outsource AI Localization

Instead of building and maintaining your own AI infrastructure and expertise in-house, you can leverage a localization vendor’s existing AI capabilities, workflows, and teams to easily scale video localization.
Here’s a breakdown of what this typically involves:

• Identifying the scope of work, budget, timeline, quality expectations, and pain points.
• Selecting the right vendor based on quality, service offerings, workflow integrations, security, support, and price.
• Onboarding your team and integrating your video platforms to the vendor’s system.
• Develop a style guide for the vendor team to promote consistent voice and terminology.
• Providing feedback and reviewing performance.

Outsourcing allows you to tap into specialized AI expertise, built-in human quality assurance in a range of languages, and complete elimination of upfront investments and ongoing management of an in-house solution.

 

Does AI Development Align with Your Long-Term Localization Vision?

The fundamental consideration when evaluating your localization strategy is this: if you’re an organization producing tens of thousands of hours of content per year, then an in-house localization workflow can offer significant advantages. This approach gives you maximum control and deep integration with your existing workflows.
However, if you’re producing thousands of hours of video content a year, the path of outsourcing to a localization vendor becomes the more strategic and efficient route. Attempting to build a complex AI solution, coupled with managing an in-house linguist team, can lead to challenges and high initial investments.

 

Benefits of Outsourcing Video Localization

For organizations where AI is not a core strength, partnering with a specialized end-to-end vendor offers compelling benefits:

• Access to Expertise: You immediately tap into the vendor’s deep knowledge and experience in both AI and localization.
• Faster Implementation: Leveraging a vendor’s platform and integration capabilities accelerates your adoption timeline.
• Reduced Risk and Cost: You avoid the significant upfront investment and ongoing overhead associated with building and maintaining an in-house localization team and infrastructure.
• Focus on Your Core Business: Your internal teams can concentrate on their core strengths – creating and managing video content – rather than becoming AI development and localization experts.
• Scalability and Flexibility: Vendors can readily scale their services to meet your fluctuating video localization needs.

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In conclusion, the decision of whether to build or outsource your localization workflow for video content is not a one-size-fits-all answer. If localization is in your core competency, then you’ll want to build; if it’s not, you’ll benefit from outsourcing.

 

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