Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce website or selling goods worldwide? If so, then you should think about providing users with the convenience of currency conversion on your site.
Currency conversion software tools let your customers have the price of an international currency transaction converted to their local currency at the point of sale. It also allows visitors to see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their home currency.
One great benefit of adding currency conversion is that it lets visitors see and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for purchasers to calculate their costs and expenses.
If you are a WordPress user, it’s easy to add currency conversion using a plugin to WordPress, allowing your site visitors to quickly work out the cost of your products.
Currencyr – Currency Converting Tool For WP Web Sites
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WordPress plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free to install and use on your website or blog.
This plugin features:
- In-line converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, like Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with various e-store plugins like WooCommerce and Shopp.
- Can determine local currency automatically
- Translation support
Important: This plugin requires your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Alternatively, ask your web hosting company to update your PHP.
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You can install the Currencyr plugin from your WP dashboard by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the “Install Now” button …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your WP dashboard navigation menu …
The plugin settings page offers you many configuration settings …
For example, you can select a base currency from a drop-down menu if you prefer a different currency than the default option ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
You can choose any supported data provider from a dropdown menu. The default option is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also choose another provider, like European Central Bank or Google Finance …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates as your provider, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can specify how often you want to update the exchange rates by choosing an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to edit the jQuery settings, you can simply ignore this option …
Edit the remainder of the plugin settings to suit your own needs and don’t forget to click ‘Save Changes’ when you have configured all of your settings …
Once your plugin settings have been configured, you can easily add currency conversion to any WordPress page using widgets.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, CAD, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Currencyr Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to pages, posts and widgets with no technical skills using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to posts and pages:
Let’s say that you sell a product for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display the price converted into British pounds (GBP) on your page.
All you need to do is add the following shortcode to your page content …
Note: You can also display prices in dollars and cents (for example, 19.95, 37.95, 399.99, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how your shortcode looks after being inserted into the post or page …
After publishing the page, the converted currency will display like this …
Using the above example, let’s also translate the same amount into different currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode below (you can add as many currency symbols as you like by using vertical pipes) …
You can see how the shortcode looks when you add it to a page …
Once your post has been published, the converted currency will then display as seen in the screenshot below …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn how to change the currency separator symbol with this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you would like to specify a different base currency than the one selected as the default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to non-European customers (like Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the shortcode appears when added to a page …
Once your page or post has been published, your converted currency amounts will then appear as shown below …
Plugin Widget
You can also add currency conversion to your website’s sidebar using the plugin’s widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar menu, select Appearance > Widgets in the WP admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to the Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget options as shown in the example below (add currency codes separated by commas), and click ‘Save’ to update your settings …
The currency conversion tool will now display on your website’s sidebar with the settings you have selected …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify a symbol of your choice to display as the currency separator when using several currencies.
You can change the symbol in the Multiple Separator settings field.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency amounts with a forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you specify another symbol and update your settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
Using The Plugin With WP-Compatible e-Commerce Platforms
As stated earlier, the Currencyr plugin can be integrated with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce and Shopp …
(above image sourced from plugin website)
And there you have it! Now you can go and easily add a currency converter to your e-commerce website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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