After anchoring last Saturday's (beautiful) call, Bela and Anne started a great email thread around tips to encourage more caller/listener participation.  Here's a few tips I've learned, but would love to have you add comments with your tips as well ...
 

--One thing that I know Birju does well is constantly encouraging folks to share -- even just their names or where they are calling in from, or what drew them to the call. Once people start speaking, it breaks a kind of barrier and it's easier for them to share more (or again another time).

--Another is to introduce an element of surprise, change up the quality of the questions, and expose some of the edges. This not only keeps things fresh, but also gives diverse entry points into the conversation (ie. if the call is on storytelling, and it become one dimensional, it may not spark the juice for everyone -- but if it touches up few provocative themes, it can engage more people)

--If call volume is low, as a host, it really helps to have some done some prep work ahead of time (around the speaker and call theme) and actively listen to the interview so that you can continue asking the guest questions to the guest, but also to the audience. For example: "Host: One of the things that has been coming up for me lately is XYZ, and I was reflecting on what you said earlier today around XYZ. I'd love to hear thoughts from all of you, our callers, on how you've handled or addressed this. Again, as a reminder, to share on the call, please push star-6 if you're dialed in, or email us or leave a message from our website. And in the meantime, Speaker, what are your thoughts on reconciling that edge?"

--Make sure to repeat how people can participate. We have an incresing number of people listening via live-stream, so their questions can also come in via email or web form (and it all automatically reaches our backend chat, so it's very easy to monitor. So find creative ways to share -- "If you're on the call, just hit *6 and you'll be prompted when it's your time to speak. If you're tuning into our live-stream, you can use the web form. And there's always email -- just email your question to ask@servicespace.org"

--An additional thing is to be natural. That is, while the moderator and host are keeping up with caller volume and modulating the questions and participation, when you are speaking, you don't want to portray that you're super busy. Instead, it's much more inviting for listeners if you can casually flow in and out ... if caller response is low, the host and moderator continue the conversation seamlessly, and if the queue is super long, the host will may even ask the speaker to keep answers short, so more voice can be included.