After Mazda reported dreadful first-quarter U.S. sales results, this article, which surveyed some of the potential reasons consumers would turn away from specific Mazda products, was read more often than any other TTAC article in April. Even as critics, myself included, endlessly point out the driver-centric ideology that makes Mazdas so fun, first-quarter sales plunged 17 percent, a loss of more than 13,000 sales for Mazda dealers.

Perhaps there’s a reverse TTAC bump. Maybe we were just practicing our latest reverse psychology techniques, attempting to lure buyers into Mazda showrooms. Like parents who tell their constipated toddlers, “You won’t like this bran muffin, no, not one bit,” to develop an inexplicable craving, we may have told you about road noise, odd ride height, poor equipment choices, and cramped rear quarters simply to stoke Mazda curiosity.

It worked. Sort of. “Mazda achieved its best April since 1995 with 26,195 vehicles sold,” the company said on Tuesday. Mazda’s market share climbed to a four-month high. Year-over-year, Mazda’s volume grew more than twice as fast as the industry average.

Even in a positive month, it’s abundantly clear that Mazda remains a mainstream auto brand with niche appeal. Fewer than 2 percent of the new vehicles sold in the United States in April 2016 were Mazdas. Ten individual nameplates from other companies — including three pickup trucks, two utility vehicles, and five cars — outsold the whole Mazda brand.

As U.S. sales of midsize cars fell 4 percent, largely due to the Chrysler 200’s massive losses, the Mazda6’s April sales slid 21 percent to its eighth consecutive sub-5,000-unit sales month.

The CX-3, despite being a new participant in one of the hottest segments in the industry, isn’t picking up any steam. CX-3 sales fell to a three-month low, the second-lowest total from the last five months. Most of the CX-3’s rivals outsold the Mazda by huge margins.

The 1.5-percent decline of Mazda’s (former) best seller, the CX-5, wouldn’t be noteworthy had America’s SUV/crossover sector not grown at an 8-percent clip.

(Note: There were 27 selling days in April 2016; 26 in April 2015. This means the daily selling rate at Mazda was up 4.6 percent, though volume grew 8.6 percent. Likewise, the U.S. auto industry’s 3.5-percent increase equalled no growth on a daily selling rate basis.)

Known as the best-selling roadster of all time, the highly regarded and recently relaunched MX-5 Miata was outsold by the Buick Cascada, albeit by only a handful of units. Rare though it continues to be, the MX-5 nevertheless played a role in Mazda’s April expansion, contributing an extra 702 sales last month, year-over-year.

There are factors working against Mazda growth in early 2016. The discontinued Mazda5 forced the loss of 382 April sales. The wait for the second-generation CX-9 flagship caused Mazda dealers to lose out on 1,250 sales, as well.

Thus, the model that historically sat at the core of the Mazda lineup was responsible for generating four in ten Mazda sales in April 2016. Sales of the Mazda3 sedan and hatchback jumped 34 percent to 10,772 units, seventh among compacts, up from tenth a year ago.

The Mazda3 was by no means the only compact to post big gains in April. Kia Forte sales shot up 36 percent. The Nissan Sentra, now America’s third-best-selling small car, recorded a 12-percent April increase. Honda Civic sales, meanwhile, jumped 35 percent to 35,331 units, good enough to dethrone the Toyota Camry (perhaps temporarily) as America’s top-selling car.

One month does not a back-on-track an automaker make. It’s not reasonable to assume Mazda can consistently grow sales of the Mazda3 at this rate. The CX-5 became Mazda USA’s best seller in 2015, but it’s now a four-year-old model in a highly competitive segment. Availability of the MX-5-based Fiat 124 Spider may, to a small degree, limit MX-5 growth.

But just as the CX-5 became what the CX-7 and Tribute never were, a genuinely high-volume small crossover, Mazda is hoping that the new CX-9 becomes a formidable challenger for the Toyota Highlander, Nissan Pathfinder, Honda Pilot, and Ford Explorer. The first CX-9 certainly wasn’t.

Perhaps we should share some of the reasons why the first CX-9 failed. Does the TTAC Reverse Psychology Bump work in the pre-owned market?

[Image Source: Mazda USA]

Timothy Cain is the founder of GoodCarBadCar.net, which obsesses over the free and frequent publication of U.S. and Canadian auto sales figures. Follow on Twitter @goodcarbadcar and on Facebook.