Prospect means a person you don't know and, eventually, don't know you. For example, it is one of the several people inside a Target List you acquired somehow.
Lead means a person which is interested on something you sell.
In short words a Lead is the evolution of a Prospect at the Sales Life Cycle.
Inside SugarCRM Prospects module manage all people you don't know well and you want to apply some marketing strategy to figure out who would be interested on something you sell. Prospects module manage some fell information.
Leads module manage people which are pretty much interested on something you sell. Note that Leads module has some additional information which identify person itself and its company as well, additionally it also can manage some opportunity information. Also note that you can convert a Lead into a Contact, Account and also into an Opportunity.
The way I understand it, leads are like a gateway to having numerous prospects. Leads that are managed effectively are more valuable towards any business success.
A lot of people confuse leads and prospects all the time. Although very basic, most salespeople fail to classify one from the other.
A lead is can be a name of a company or a person that you can find on lists you purchased, persons who downloaded your white paper or attended your webinar. Leads need to be called so you can qualify or disqualify them as prospects.
On the other hand, a prospect is a person or company where your products and services can create value.
In many CRM systems, and indeed in many selling systems, "a lead is a need". This may or may not be associated with a person. For example, in some selling systems you might have heard that acme Inc. is building a new plant. That could be a lead for someone to research; eventually the research turns up a person who is a contact and is connected to that lead.
In Sugar, however, a lead is a person.
I'm not saying Sugar's paradigm is right or wrong, but we need to understand how it works to use the leads module effectively.
