 The paper examined the online visibility of research conducted in South Africa related to poverty alleviation. It was concerned that the research may not be easily accessible or discoverable due to the extreme levels of inequality and poverty in the country. The authors conducted an experiment using Google searches to assess the visibility of South African research and development work in the field of poverty alleviation. They were aware that significant amounts of public money are invested in research and development, which should lead to the production and dissemination of locally generated knowledge as a public good based on local realities. This knowledge should then inform and reflect on national and regional development practice, while also contributing perspectives from the south to the global corpus of poverty research. Research published online should therefore be freely available and actively shared in order to maximize its value and impact. There are exponential benefits to be gained from the links between research, scholarly publications and social development, which originate from local knowledge production and are amplified by the accessibility and discoverability of that research. Accessibility and discoverability increase the breadth and depth of the potential users, value and impact of the research. This article was authored by Laura Chennewicks and Kelsey Wiens.