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How is Fintech Disrupting the Finance Industry?
31
Oct

How is Fintech Disrupting the Finance Industry?

31 October 2019 Posted by Elite Asia Globalisation Technology , , , , , , , No Comments

For those who haven’t heard of fintech, it simply refers to the technology that is being used to improve functions and services within the finance industry. This has ranged from the software used by banks to improve the handling of customer accounts to super-fast money transfers and online shopping.

Indeed, whether you call it fintech disruption or improvement, here are of the ways that technology is transforming the finance industry:

 

Customer Service AI Bots

 

Chatbots are one of the most valued programmes in modern technology, particularly for financial companies. Mainly used on websites, these bots can help to handle customer queries that can be found on their website. This means that a customer won’t need to call and use the time of a human assistant to help, which means that employee can focus on trickier customer queries.

Not only does this save money for a company, but your customers have a better overall level of satisfaction as their query is answered quickly and efficiently.

 

AI for Fraud Detection

 

Although we can now access our bank and credit card accounts anywhere thanks to smartphones, that doesn’t mean that we actively check these accounts for fraudulent activity. Which means, without fintech, we won’t see fraud until our money is gone.

Many banks and financial companies are now using AI technology to flag potential fraud as it happens. Meaning both you and your bank are alerted quickly so that you can act fast to lock and re-secure your accounts.

This is not just used for fraud with customers, though, as banks themselves use this AI technology to flag and block attacks from hackers looking to mine sensitive information, which can cost those in the finance industry millions if successful.

 

Stronger Security Through Biometrics

 

As technology advances, passwords are becoming less and less safe for protecting our sensitive data. Particularly when a large majority of us use the same password for multiple websites and accounts. Which is why fintech is working on more secure ways to protect our accounts, by implementing biometrics for security. This includes thumbprints, facial recognition, vocal patterns and irises.

Many banks are rolling out biometrics to help their customers protect their accounts, particularly on smartphones that can be stolen.

 

The Dropping Need for Brick-and-Mortar Banks

 

With more people doing their banking online, through apps and websites, there has been a drop in the demand for banks to open and maintain brick-and-mortar banks. Indeed, many banks are now looking to save money by closing banks in several towns and villages.

This isn’t always met with enthusiasm though, as many rural communities with businesses are unable to conduct all their banking online. This means they will need to travel to get to a physical bank.

While some might call it fintech disruption, there is no denying that advancements in technology are helping customers and companies alike to improve security and streamline processes. Which is particularly important with online shopping and smartphones now being a normal part of society.

Digital Marketing Trends in 2020
18
Sep

Digital Marketing Trends in 2020

18 September 2019 Posted by Elite Asia Globalisation Linguistics Technology , , , , , , , , No Comments

As we are now past the halfway mark of 2019, while businesses are still busy with this year’s efforts, they will also be looking to next year and what 2020 holds for the world of digital marketing.

There are no indications that digital marketing is going to be any less important. However, some digital marketing trends may take prominence in those 12 months. In the following post, we will look at five.

 

The Rise of New Technologies

 

During 2020 there are some sure-fire signs that businesses across sectors will start to use new technologies as part of their digital marketing strategies and to enhance the experience of their customers.

Augmented reality and artificial intelligence are two that look set to improve things overall. You can bet we will see these constantly evolving and improving technologies used on an even wider scale than they have been in the past.

 

Greater Emphasis on Personalisation in Email Marketing

 

Modern customers are looking for greater personalization from companies and brands, which is why marketing teams appreciate it’s often the small and subtle things that make the difference. Email marketing will continue to become more personalised and cater directly to specific segments of a company’s market.

Along with making emails more personal though, there is also going to greater attention paid to developing emails that will work well on mobile handsets and devices, such as smartphones and tablets, as that’s where a large percentage of people access their personal email from.

 

More Attention Will be Given to Geo-Marketing

 

Over the last few years, businesses in general have been utilising geo-marketing as part of their marketing strategies. However, with the demand for more accurate results, there’s been the development of geo-fencing and other brand-new technologies that bridge the gap ever so slightly between brands and their customers. Geo-fencing has been particularly effective as it enables businesses to build awareness for their brand and message while attracting competitor’s clients.

 

Video Will be Used to Enhance SEO

 

Businesses use SEO so understand the behaviour of their consumers. As search engines are always making changes and updates to ensure the most engaging and user-friendly sites are displayed and presented to users, companies need to constantly switch their approach and focus to stay in the rankings when the algorithms change.

That’s where video is important because video content is shared around 1,2000% more than the complete sum of text and links. That’s why there will be more businesses who will use videos to improve their SEO.

 

More Conversational Engagement on Social Media

 

As social media has continued to take a foothold in the world, businesses have needed to adapt and become more approachable and personable with their target audience and customers. This will undoubtedly continue in 2020, with an even greater focus on brands using social listening over conversations concerning their rivals and their brand. This will be valuable for helping them understand the content that performs best.

 
AI Translation: Expectations Vs. Reality
13
Jun

AI Translation: Expectations Vs. Reality

13 June 2019 Posted by Elite Asia Globalisation Linguistics Localisation Technology Translation & Interpretation , , , No Comments

AI technology has drastically improved due to scientists enabling computer programs to ‘self-learn’. Hence, a computer can re-program its own code in order to function better at its task at hand. Which begs the question, is AI translation set to become another norm in our lives?

 

What is AI Translation?

 

Rather than using a human translator, an AI translation will automatically translate one language into another. As a result, allowing you to comprehend what someone is saying in another language and hold a conversation with them.

AI technology can read individual words in a number of languages. It finds the similarities between the different languages that exist between words. Thereafter, building a translation!

 

The Advantages of AI Translation

 

When people hear that AI translation tools exist, they tend to expect translation tools used in sci-fi programs. Such as Doctor Who and Star Trek, where you hear people talking in your native tongue. However, this is far from reality!

Instead, the main advantages of AI translator tools in comparison to human translators is that AI is both cheaper and quicker. Here are some of the other advantages of using AI to translate languages:

  • Quality in domain- and language-specific engines is enhanced
  • Incredibly quick, normally only takes a minute or so
  • Ideal for websites
  • AI tools will let you translate a large number of languages, whereas a human may only be able to translate one or two
  • Becoming more accurate

The Disadvantages of AI Translation

 

Although machine translation looks good on paper, there are a number of disadvantages:

  • Accuracy can be low in some industries. (You may not realise this as you may be unfamiliar with the language)
  • Mass localisation is poor, with some languages giving more accurate results than others
  • AI does not recognise the context something is said in, so can produce confusing results
  • A language mistake can be very costly i.e. a tattoo in another language

 

The Reality

 

Many people put a lot of faith into AI translation tools because they see them as a fast and low-cost way to translate a large volume of texts. This is very common in industries such as Finance, E-Commerce, Legal etc.. AI translation may prove to be a powerful tool to achieve massive localisation. However, the accuracy of the different languages is not yet standardised.

 

In Conclusion

 

If you need something translated from another language, you should weigh up the cost of a bad translation against the cost of using a human translator. A bad translation will not only cost your turnaround to be longer but it also costs more money to resolve the mistakes!

If you’re looking to localise an e-commerce website or a large-scale portal, then AI translation is wonderful. In fact, you can leverage on a domain- and language-specific translation machines and human post-editing to translate high volume contents to targeted languages.

This encourages the user to repeatedly visit your website and may even recommend it to friends.

How to Ensure Your E-Commerce Website Localisation is Ready?
20
May

How to Ensure Your E-Commerce Website Localisation is Ready?

20 May 2019 Posted by Elite Asia Globalisation Localisation Technology , , , , , , No Comments

Business is going global and e-commerce is booming. That means you’ll soon have to make sure that your e-commerce business is able to keep up with international demand. But, before you can do that, you’ll need to make sure your e-commerce website appeals to the international audience. This is done through e-commerce website localisation. In other words, you localise your website in order to make it more relevant to your local audiences.

Here are a few ways to go about it.

 

User Interface

 

It is easy to fall victim to the false idea that your user interface doesn’t impact user behaviour as long as it is designed well. The truth is that the design of your user interface can have an impact on how it is received among certain groups.

For instance, factors such as character choice, word length, shopping icons etc do tend to vary according to culture. So, you will have to start paying attention to these details and make the necessary changes.

Exchange Rates/Currency

 

Make sure you update prices to reflect current exchange rates and local pricing trends. There are also conversion norms that you’ll have to follow. Each country has its own norms, so take the time to research and study such topics.

For pricing elements such as VAT, make sure the necessary rules are built in for when they’re applicable.

 

Payment Processing

 

It is an established fact that online shoppers tend to prefer shopping in their home currency. So, to ensure your e-commerce website localisation is ready, make sure your shopping cart is capable of carrying out these conversions in real time. Also, pay attention to the payment processing solutions used in each market. There can be location-based preferences with regard to this as well.

 

Legalities

 

One of the harsh realities of doing business across the globe is to comply with regulatory policies and legal requirements. Now, the rules and laws vary from country to country. This is why you need to start focusing on these things and learn about them. This will prevent you from having to deal with regulatory or compliance issues in the future.

For instance, using copyrighted material for your local website can trigger legal problems. So, pay attention.

 

Conclusion

 

As business becomes more global, there is no doubt that your e-commerce website will soon have to adapt. The facts are in and the simple truth is people prefer to shop in their own language. They want businesses to truly cater to them in every way possible. This is where e-commerce website localisation steps in.

So, it’s time to adapt and catch up with the trend.

Is AI Translation Really Changing the Industry?
7
May

Is AI Translation Really Changing the Industry?

7 May 2019 Posted by Elite Asia Globalisation Linguistics Technology Translation & Interpretation , , , , , , , , No Comments

As the business arena becomes more globalised, the need for localisation via translation grows and that growth fuels the need for better and more effective translation technologies (such as AI translation). As they say, necessity is the mother of all inventions. This philosophy stands true even for translation technology.

The growth in translation needs gave birth to machine translation (MT), which overcame much of the challenges posed by traditional translation processes. But new challenges keep cropping up. Fortunately, newer technologies are showing up to save the day.

One such technology is Artificial Intelligence or AI-based translation. AI translation offers distinct advantages compared to the older MT technology. For instance, it can factor in linguistic nuances and context to provide more accurate translations.

 

Already in Play

 

AI-based translation is already at play. You can see it everywhere from Google to Facebook. For instance, if you visit an international website via Google, you’ll have the option of seeing the translated version. There’s almost no human involvement or intervention here. It’s Google’s own automated translation service.

Microsoft is also offering its own real-time translation app, which can translate speech, text, and even images. What’s even more amazing is that this application can run offline, making instant translation a reality.

Even Facebook switched to AI translation as its primary approach in 2017.

One of the key benefits of AI translation is that it factors in context and entire sentences, which boosts accuracy.

 

Neural Machine Translation (NMT)

 

Traditional MT relied upon existing translations or translation memories to get the job done. However, now, we have something called Neural Machine Translation or NMT.  NMT makes use of translation memories as well. But it goes further and uses something called deep learning to boost translation accuracy.

NMT literally builds what is called an artificial neural network, sort of a like a human brain. What does that mean? Well, it means that the system can correct itself by going back, assessing, and correcting its approach or method.

On the contrary, traditional or statistical MT relies on correlation to choose the best possible translation. This method simply does not provide the same level of accuracy.

 

Conclusion

 

AI-based translation has come quite far. However, there are still some challenges to be overcome. For instance, AI translations are still plagued by grammatical inaccuracies. There are also complaints of such translations lacking nuance.

So, human translation still remains a necessity. Though AI translation may be evolving, it is too soon to predict its overall impact on the translation and localisation industry.

 

How Artificial Intelligence Works When Translating a Language

 

How-Artificial-Intelligence-Works-When-Translating-Language

Thanks to globalisation, translation is one area that’s recently been given the Artificial Intelligence treatment. So, how does AI actually aid translation?

Read More >