I came across this website the other day and found it amusing. It uses something called the “Way Back Machine” to take a look at some major corporate websites back in 1996. It’s amazing to see how far design and usability has come in 11 years. Design conventions were not widely used in the early days of the web and usability was a topic given little thought.

Though design styles may change usability will always be the most important feature of the website. Usability should be the biggest factor when planning and designing your website. You may have the best products or services, you may rank #1 on lots of search terms but if people can’t easily use your site and find the information they are looking for in a short time it does you no good.

Take a look at those websites and learn from the past – to not make some of the same mistakes they did with bad design and usability.