secure sales. Since our potential customers may evaluate our products before, if ever, executing definitive agreements, we may incur substantial expenses and spend significant management and legal effort in connection with a potential customer.
Our multi-product offering and the increasingly complex needs of our customers contribute to a longer and unpredictable sales cycle. Consequently, we often face difficulty predicting the quarter in which expected sales will actually occur. This contributes to the uncertainty and fluctuations in our future operating results. In particular, the corporate decision-making and approval process of our customers and potential customers has become more complicated. This has caused our average sales cycle to further increase and, in some cases, has prevented the closure of sales that we believed were likely to close.
Because we depend on a relatively small number of customers for a substantial portion of our revenue, the loss of any of these customers or our failure to attract new significant customers could adversely impact our revenue and harm our business.
We have in the past and expect in the future to derive a substantial portion of our revenue from sales to a relatively small number of customers. The composition of these customers has varied in the past, and we expect that it will continue to vary over time. The loss of any significant customer or a decline in business with any significant customer would materially and adversely affect our financial condition and results of operations.
The market for customer engagement software is intensely competitive, and our business will be adversely affected if we are unable to successfully compete.
The market for customer engagement software is intensely competitive. Other than product innovation and existing customer relationships, there are no substantial barriers to entry in this market, and established or new entities may enter this market in the future. While software internally developed by enterprises represents indirect competition, we also compete directly with packaged application software vendors, including Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc., LivePerson, Inc., NICE Ltd., and Verint Systems Inc. In addition, we face actual or potential competition from larger software companies such as Microsoft Corporation, Oracle Corporation, salesforce.com Inc., and ServiceNow, Inc., and similar companies that may attempt to sell customer engagement software to their installed base.
We believe competition will continue to be fierce as current competitors increase the sophistication of their offerings and as new participants enter the market. Many of our current and potential competitors have longer operating histories, larger customer bases, broader brand recognition, and significantly greater financial, marketing and other resources. With more established and better-financed competitors, these companies may be able to undertake more extensive marketing campaigns, adopt more aggressive pricing policies, and make more attractive offers to businesses to induce them to use their products or services. If we are unable to compete successfully, our business will be adversely affected.
If we fail to expand and improve our sales performance and marketing activities, or retain our sales and marketing personnel, we may be unable to grow our business, which could negatively impact our operating results and financial condition.
Expansion and growth of our business is dependent on our ability to expand our sales force and on the ability of our sales force to increase sales. If we are not able to effectively develop and maintain awareness of our products in a cost-effective manner, we may not achieve widespread acceptance of our existing and future products. This may result in a failure to expand and attract new customers and enhance relationships with existing customers. This may impede our efforts to improve operations in our other areas and may result in declines in the market price of our common stock.
Due to the complexity of our customer engagement hub platform and related products and services, we must utilize highly trained sales personnel to educate prospective customers regarding the use and benefits of our products and services as well as provide effective customer support. If we have turnover in our sales and marketing teams, we may not be able to successfully compete with our competitors, and our results of operations and financial condition may be harmed.
Our failure to maintain, develop or expand strategic and third-party distribution channels would impede our revenue growth.
Our success and future growth depend in part upon the skills, experience, performance and continued service of our distribution partners, including software and hardware vendors and resellers. Our distribution partners engage with us in a