The word mockup is uncommon to most Malaysians who half the time are selfishly doing their own thing at the top while the smarter ones try to learn about it. But to make the selfish even worst, they try to be smart and act as if they know what it is.
It’s lying, impolite, rude, and unprofessional. These people take advantage of it due to their higher level and power to hide a weakness. As much as I’d like to be talking about some of these Malaysian clients, let me clear the fog of the meaning; design mockup.
A ‘mockup’ defined by Google:
A visual presentation of a design or page layout that approximates what the final printed piece might look like.
In other words, being a website designer the mockup sometimes is either a homepage and content page layout or sometimes it’s the two pages that could work on a browser. Normally, a mockup doesn’t mean the whole website will reading and working. If a website designer were asked to do that, they’d be better of building the website than showing a mockup to the client.
Sometimes its understandable some clients have no idea of this. And it’s even less harm to ask your designer to explain what do they mean by a mockup. Asking a question doesn’t present your weakness but a sense of self-discovery and an interest to learn what trouble your designer is going through to work their best for you.
So clarify with your client before the work starts that a mockup means you’ll show them either the designs or a small sample of how the website works. If they request for the whole website to work, explain to them that would be done in the prototype later on in development.
If they insist to have it done in the early stage, try to be patient and tell them that they shouldn’t take such an irrational action that might cost them more above what you might’ve already quoted them.
There’s one thing I’ve learnt most clients being afraid of here in Malaysia and that is the increase of price. Well, unless they’re a huge company who’s set aside RM500,000 to splurge on their website.