The Made of Ballarat campaign, designed to attract a greater number of affluent domestic visitors, won the advertising campaign of the year at the Mumbrella Travel Marketing Awards on Thursday.

The Melbourne-based Town Square agency, which also works with Sovereign Hill, was the organisation behind the campaign.

Harry Corsham, a partner at the company, told The Courier he was "very, very proud" of the work his staff had put in, which saw the campaign rated more highly than one launched last year for Tourism New Zealand, an organisation often noted for its successful, high profile marketing.

"We're proud of how the campaign represents the real Ballarat and the region around Ballarat - and how it brings it to life for an audience that had too often written Ballarat off," Mr Corsham said.

He added the campaign was targeting a particular audience outside of Ballarat, which he defined as "Melbourne's lifestyle leaders".

He said: "Our objective was to get visitors spend their time - preferably overnight - and their money in the region.

"The campaign has to move those opinion leaders first otherwise it goes nowhere."

He said a key part of the campaign was to involve a variety of different tourism operators to the campaign, which focused on the evolving culinary and creative scene in the region.

"We believe it has played a role in shifting perceptions and increasing visitation in Ballarat."

The campaign ran across a variety of different channels including in cinemas and at a pop-up store in central Melbourne from late 2018, running for more than half of last year.

It was funded by Visit Ballarat, the former council-funded organisation that ran the city's tourism marketing until last September.

The campaign's popularity among many local tourism operators proved a concern when the council's decision to end the arrangement with Visit Ballarat was taken last June.

At a meeting following a council decision to remove funding from the organisation last June, the City of Ballarat CEO Justine Linley described the campaign as "brilliant" and said it would not stop.

The website for the campaign is not currently live.

Mr Corsham described the campaign as having a "very rich bank of creative assets" which had significant shelf life.

"The value of the campaign has not been fully yielded," he said, adding that it was "disappointing" it no longer seemed to have a sponsor.

Ballarat mayor Cr Ben Taylor said the campaign remained "in market" but not in its original format, with assets being used for the current Weekends in Ballarat campaign.

He said council was continuing to work closely with local tourism industry representatives.

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