Localizing Virtual Agent conversations

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Localizing Virtual Agent conversations

    The ServiceNow platform offers comprehensive localization capabilities for Virtual Agent conversations, allowing you to translate chat topics and responses effectively. Using the ServiceNow Localization Framework, you can standardize, track, and manage the entire translation process, whether leveraging machine translation, third-party translation management systems (TMS), or manual import/export workflows.

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    Key Features

    • Localization Framework: Configurable to manage translation fulfillment methods, roles, and business rules such as auto-translation, publication, and approval requirements.
    • Roles: Defines specific responsibilities including Localization Requestor, Localization Fulfiller, and Localization Editor to streamline the translation workflow.
    • Support for Topic Discovery Methods:
      • Keyword topic discovery: Translates conversation text and associated keywords.
      • Natural Language Understanding (NLU) topic discovery: Requires localization of both topics and model groups, with translations requested in Virtual Agent Designer and NLU Workbench respectively.
    • Translation Management by Model: Enables viewing, requesting, editing, and testing translations per language and model directly within Virtual Agent Designer.
    • Support for NLU Languages: Allows enabling installed languages within Virtual Agent settings for language-specific NLU models.
    • Editing and Bulk Translation Requests: Administrators can edit translations within Virtual Agent Designer and request bulk translations across multiple topics via the [syscstopic] table.
    • Localization Methods in Scripts: Scripts can be authored to display original text when translations are unavailable, facilitating smoother localization readiness.
    • Language Support for NLU Services: Entity extraction is limited to specific languages on ServiceNow NLU models; intent matching is supported for others. Third-party NLU services like IBM Watson Assistant and Microsoft LUIS have varying language support.
    • Translation Storage: Translated content is stored in the [systranslatedtext] and [sysuimessage] database tables.

    Prerequisites and Setup

    • Activate the ServiceNow language plugins for each target language; the Localization Framework installs by default.
    • Configure translation modes in the Localization Framework, choosing machine translation, TMS, or email-based workflows.
    • If using NLU, enable desired languages in Virtual Agent settings and add secondary languages to the NLU model groups as needed.
    • Assign localization roles to team members according to their responsibilities.
    • Ensure translatable strings do not include embedded quotes, as these cannot be localized currently.

    Practical Benefits

    ServiceNow customers can efficiently manage multilingual Virtual Agent interactions by leveraging a structured localization process. This ensures consistent, accurate translations and streamlined workflows for translation requests, fulfillment, and publishing. The support for both keyword and NLU-based topics allows flexibility in how conversations are designed and localized. Administrators gain control over translation status, editing, and bulk requests, improving productivity and time-to-market for multilingual Virtual Agent deployments.

    The ServiceNow platform provides several methods for localizing Virtual Agent conversations, depending on your needs. Use the Localization Framework to manage all aspects of the translation process, whether you are using machine translation, a third-party provider, or both.

    Use the ServiceNow Localization Framework to standardize and track the translation process for Virtual Agent topics. The framework enables you to define the business process for translating your conversations. Use it to configure the following:
    • How localization requests are fulfilled.

      Options include machine translation, a translation management system (TMS), and exporting and importing files.

    • Who is responsible for each step in the process.

      Virtual Agent uses the following roles:

      • Localization requestor
      • Localization fulfiller
      • Localization editor
    • Business rules for the process:
      • Auto translation and publication
      • Approval required for translation and publication

    To learn more, see Localization Framework. To learn more about localization roles, see Localization roles for Virtual Agent.

    Localizing topics

    The localization process flow depends on the method of topic discovery that you are using for your topics. The following types of topic discovery are supported using the Localization Framework.

    • Keyword topic discovery

      When you use the Localization Framework, the chat conversation and the keywords associated with the topic are translated.

    • Natural Language Understanding (NLU) topic discovery

      If your topics use NLU, both the topic and the model group must be localized. When you request a translation from Virtual Agent Designer, the topic and any optional keywords are translated. You must request translation for model groups from NLU Workbench. For more information about that process, see Translate a multilingual model.

      Once the topic and secondary models are localized, you may need to map the models to the topic before publishing them.

    Prerequisites

    Important:
    Currently, translatable strings such as topic text and bot responses cannot contain embedded quotes. Strings that contain embedded quotes cannot be localized.
    Do the following before you begin managing translations:
    • Activate the ServiceNow plugin for each language you want to support.

      The Localization Framework is also installed by default. For more information, see Activate a language.

    • Configure the translation mode that you want to use in the Localization Framework.

      You can configure machine translation, a translation management system (TMS), or send via email. For more information, see Translation modes.

    • If you are using Natural Language Understanding (NLU), enable languages in Virtual Agent settings.

      For more information, see Enable NLU languages in Virtual Agent settings.

    • If necessary, add secondary languages to your NLU model group. For more information, see Multilingual model management.
    • Assign localization roles to team member groups.

      Users are assigned different roles based on their responsibilities for the translation process. For more information, see Localization roles for Virtual Agent.

    Manage languages by model

    If NLU is enabled for your instance, you can view and manage translations by model and language. Navigate to All > Conversational Interfaces > Virtual Agent > Designer, and then click Manage languages. Choose a model and a language, and then you can do the following:
    • View translation status
    • Request translations
    • View or edit translations
    • Test translations

    Click Manage NLU translations for easy access to the model management page in NLU Workbench.

    For more information, see Localize Virtual Agent topics that use NLU topic discovery.