The application of AI in customer experience is evolving from deploying point solutions to leveraging AI-embedded platforms.
All-in-one AI suites, like NICE Enlighten AI, support businesses that need to infuse intelligence across every stage of the customer service experience.
Indeed, Enlighten AI offers access to features for automating common processes, enhancing data-driven decision-making, and transforming self-service, all in one unified ecosystem.
NICE believes its focus on developing trusted, context-specific, accurate, and efficient AI solutions makes Enlighten the “ultimate” system for AI-driven businesses.
So, what more does this ecosystem offer, what are the benefits, and how much does it cost? Let’s find out.
NICE Enlighten AI: The Core Features
First announced in 2021, NICE Enlighten AI supports companies in infusing AI into every element of their customer service experiences.
Additionally, it combines AI-powered analytics, knowledge management, agent assistance, and self-service solutions into a complete CX AI platform.
Over the last few years, NICE has continuously built on this ecosystem, introducing new hyper-personalization elements, expanded generative AI models, and advanced security guardrails.
That’s the short story. Below is a deeper dive into the toolkit’s key components.
NICE Enlighten AI Actions: Enhancing Data
NICE Enlighten AI Actions is an analytics engine that sifts through mountains of customer interaction data in real time, guiding teams toward “high-impact” decisions.
The solution isolates trends, inefficiencies, and execution gaps, tapping into data from more than 40 applications in CXone – NICE’s CCaaS platform – and third-party data sources.
Users can access findings in a simple visual dashboard, ask natural language questions about opportunities, and automatically create reports and dashboards.
Ultimately, this system helps to accelerate decision velocity and improve operational efficiency faster than ever.
NICE Enlighten AI Copilot for Agents: Real-Time Assistance
NICE Enlighten AI Copilot is a virtual assistant that supports contact center employees in completing their daily workflows.
The solution supports supervisors and managers with performance management, reporting, and data analysis.
Yet, the Copilot offers most capabilities to agents, listening to conversations, tracking customer sentiment, and instantly surfacing guidance from knowledge sources.
Also, the virtual agent identifies upsell and cross-sell opportunities while handling repetitive tasks, like contact summarization.
Enlighten Autopilot Knowledge: AI-Powered Conversational Support
Enlighten Autopilot Knowledge helps contact center teams access the data they need faster to deliver quicker, context-rich, and personalized customer responses.
Built to mimic human conversation patterns, the system combines multiple knowledge sources to answer questions, recognizing various phrasing styles and accents while ensuring brand alignment.
NICE suggests that the system is quick to deploy (once companies have set up their knowledge base) and immediately reduces contact center workloads.
Moreover, it empowers streamlined self-service, allowing users to rapidly seek answers to questions without human intervention.
Enlighten Autopilot: Self-Service with a Conversational Edge
Enlighten Autopilot goes beyond the knowledge retrieval capabilities of the “Autopilot Knowledge” solution, handling more complex customer requests.
Supporting text and voice-based interactions, it can manage various tasks, from processing payments to scheduling appointments.
Also, it identifies customer sentiment and intent while prioritizing conversations based on potential ROI.
Lastly, Enlighten Autopilot can automatically construct and optimize conversation flows to reduce bot failure.
Users can build bot flows without coding and infuse their own data and guardrails into the AI experience.
Enlighten XM: Memory-Driven Hyper-Personalization
One of the most recent updates to the NICE Enlighten AI ecosystem – “Enlighten XM” – was introduced in 2024.
Enlighten “Experience Memory (XM)” compiles metadata, conversation data, and analytics into a unified memory graph.
All that data feeds a large language model (LLM) that gives bots more in-depth memory capabilities to enable continuous, contextual interactions with customers.
Enlighten XM also allows virtual agents to instantly pick up a conversation wherever it left off, regardless of the channel.
The persistent memory even supports human agents by giving them a real-time summary of a customer’s preferences, history, and previous friction points.
NICE Enlighten AI: The Benefits
NICE Enlighten AI is far from the only example of an AI-powered solution for customer service leaders. However, it has its differentiators.
For instance, NICE Enlighten’s AI tools aren’t “generic” – they’re purpose-built for CX.
Also, Enlighten’s AI models are built on the largest historical data set ever created specifically for contact centers.
Alongside this, companies can also augment these models by leveraging brand-specific knowledge for accurate, contextual insights and support throughout the customer journey.
Then, there are a few other features, like:
- Generative AI at Scale: Generative capabilities powered by custom models enable more nuanced conversations, capturing brand tone and reducing the risk of off-brand replies.
- Control with Security Guardrails: Each output is screened to ensure accuracy, confidentiality, and alignment with brand guidelines, reducing the risks of AI tools.
- Holistic Integration: By weaving directly into CXone, and the NICE Mpower solution, NICE Enlighten AI consolidates data streams and activities under one roof.
NICE Enlighten AI Pricing: How Much Does it Cost?
Previously, NICE gave companies the option to purchase six different packages for its CXone ecosystem and add Enlighten AI capabilities to the mix on an à la carte basis.
However, in late 2024, NICE introduced a new solution: the NICE mPower Ultimate suite.
Priced at $249 per agent per month, this bundle includes all core CXone capabilities and the NICE Enlighten AI suite – Actions, Autopilot, Copilot, and XM.
Final Thoughts on NICE Enlighten AI
Between the domain-trained models, evolving generative AI, and new memory-driven personalization engine, NICE Enlighten AI is supporting many businesses in transforming their service experiences.
The suite addresses various customer journey phases, from initial contact to post-resolution follow-ups.
By integrating advanced AI into everyday workflows, businesses improve efficiency and foster deeper connections with customers.
To learn more about what NICE is doing in the contact center market, check out CX Today’s rundown of the Gartner Magic Quadrant for CCaaS.
