As AI reshapes property search, agents have been urged to review their online strategies as a growing visibility gap puts future leads and listings at risk.
New research by Properti has revealed a major digital visibility gap across the real estate industry, with most agents failing to appear where buyers and sellers are searching online.
According to Properti’s 2026 Digital Visibility Index (DVI), the first study of its kind, the industry has been suffering from a major online presence gap, with just 20.8 per cent of the country’s 38,240 agents visible online.
The Properti DVI measured agents across Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google, and realestate.com.au, combining presence, content quality, engagement, video and reviews into a single score out of 100.
It found that, across the country, the industry had an average visibility score of 59.5, placing it well below that of top-performing agents.
According to Properti CEO Craig Deveson, AI has been reshaping property discovery, with leads increasingly generated through agency websites, direct channels, and emerging search platforms, rewarding agents who control their own digital presence.
“For twenty years, agents rented their visibility from portals because there was no alternative. That is changing fast.”
“As AI rewrites how buyers discover property and vendors find agents, the agents who own their own presence are the ones who will compound, while everyone else keeps paying the toll,” Deveson said.
The analysis found that, across the board, LinkedIn was the most commonly used platform among Australian real estate agents.
Despite the professional platform leading in raw account claims, the study found that consumer-facing discovery happened overwhelmingly on Instagram and Facebook, with vendors typically searching there first before cross-checking on Google.
In total, only 7,954 agents, around one in five, were active on both Instagram and Facebook, forming the core discovery-ready cohort capturing a disproportionate share of inbound inquiries.
The rest were either only partially present online, while 38.6 per cent of agents had no discoverable social presence at all, missing customers and potential leads.
More visibility or better content?
Across the country, smaller markets have been leading the way in digital visibility, with Tasmania ranking the highest with a Visibility Score of 66.2.
This was followed by South Australia at 61.7 per cent and the Northern Territory at 61.1 per cent, showing that tighter markets and relationship-driven dynamics lifted overall performance.
By contrast, New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland sat lower on average, reflecting larger and more competitive agent pools.
However, the three major states had the highest concentration of top-tier agents who operated as media-like businesses and produced consistent, branded content with above-average engagement.
The report found the gap between average agents and top performers was not effort, but system.
It said that a consistent set of behaviours separates the top from the crowd, with weekly on-camera content, clear suburb ownership, coordinated use of Instagram and Facebook, fast response times, and bios built for conversion rather than contact details.
“The few who get there have removed personal willpower from the equation: a content engine, a calendar and dedicated production support. Without that, even highly motivated agents drift back within a quarter,” the report said.
Reputation gap
The Properti Digital Visibility Index also exposed a clear blind spot in how agents managed their online reputation, with most not owning a Google Business Profile and instead relying on their agency listing.
The analysis found that the strongest operators built both in parallel, growing their own reviews and presence while reinforcing the agency brand, allowing the two to compound rather than compete.
It showed that agents who owned their own profile already averaged 4.65 stars, above the 4.42 agency benchmark, with Google remaining the most credible signal of consumer sentiment compared to the uniformly high but less differentiating ratings on realestate.com.au.
The report also found that a significant share of agents hid behind agency channels, where listings, reviews and content were published under the office handle rather than their own name.
“Agency-level content is valuable, and network teams should keep producing it. But every selling agent, principal aside, should run a parallel personal channel where listings, reviews and market commentary post under their own handle.”
Properti said that by staying behind their networks’ names, agents created borrowed visibility that was neither searchable nor portable, with the assets remaining within the office if they departed.
By contrast, agents who built their own channels accumulated reviews, ranked under their own names, and carried a lasting digital reputation throughout their careers.
“This is not about technology replacing agents. It is about technology making good agents more findable and more credible. The Index gives every agent in the country a clear baseline and a way to move,” Deveson concluded.
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