Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce web site or making goods and services available for sale globally? If so, then here’s a great idea: consider providing your potential customers with the convenience of currency conversion on your site.
Currency conversion lets your prospects have the cost of a foreign currency transaction translated into their local currency when purchasing products online. It also allows your visitors and customers to see the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their home currency.
One great benefit of displaying currency conversion is that it lets visitors see and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is powered by WordPress, you can add a currency converter to your WordPress website, allowing your prospective customers to quickly calculate the cost of your products.
Currencyr – WordPress Currency Converting Plugin
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WP plugin with a unique converter tooltip. And, it’s also free!
Plugin features include the following:
- In-line converter
- Supports a number of exchange rates providers, such as Google & European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with a number of e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, Shop and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can determine local currency automatically
- Translation support
Important: This plugin requires your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Ask your web host to upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking “Install Now” …
When you have installed and activated the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your WP admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings section offers you many configuration options …
For example, you can choose a base currency from a dropdown menu. The default option is ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
Similarly, you can select which data provider you want to use from a drop-down menu. The default selection is Yahoo Finance, but you can also choose another provider, like FoxRate or Google Finance …
Note: If you choose Open Exchange Rates, you will need to obtain an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can select how frequently you would like to update the exchange rates by choosing an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WP plugins).
Unless you have a reason to modify the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Edit the remainder of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click the Save Changes button when finished …
After you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can add currency conversion to your WordPress posts and pages using a shortcode.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, ZAR, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Using Plugin Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into WP pages, posts and widgets without having to edit your web templates using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to WordPress pages and posts:
Let’s say that you sell an item on your site for a fixed amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to show your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To display this information, just insert the following shortcode to your post or page …
Note: You can also insert pricing in dollars and cents (e.g. 188.35, 79.45, 129.10, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode will look when inserting it into the product page …
When your page has been published, the converted currency amount will display like this …
Using the same example, let’s now convert the same amount into different currencies.
To do this, use the shortcode below (add as many currency symbols as you like by using vertical pipes) …
The example below now shows how the shortcode appears when inserted into a page …
Once the post has been published, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol within the Currencyr plugin.
Now, suppose you would like to specify a different base currency than the one selected as the default.
For example, say you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your website targeted to visitors in countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the above shortcode looks when inserted into a page …
Once your page or post has been published, the converted currency will then display as you can see below …
Using The Currencyr Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your site’s sidebar using the Currencyr widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar area, choose Appearance > Widgets from your WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an ‘Active Widgets’ location …
Configure the widget options as shown below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter tool will now show on the sidebar with the settings you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using several currencies.
You can select a different symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings field.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency amounts using the forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you change this symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As described earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with a number of WP-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image sourced from plugin site)
And there you have it! Now you know how to easily add currency conversion to your e-commerce site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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