Do you plan to set up an e-commerce site with WordPress, or sell your products worldwide? If so, then it’s a great idea to consider providing users with a currency conversion tool.
Currency conversion allows your prospects to translate international currency amounts to their home currency at the point of sale. It also lets visitors view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their local currency.
One great advantage of adding currency conversion to your site is that it lets customers view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is built using WordPress, you can add a currency conversion plugin to WordPress, allowing your prospective customers to quickly and easily work out the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – WordPress Free Currency Converting Plugin
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a visually attractive converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
This plugin features:
- In-line converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, like Yahoo! & FoxRates
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with various e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can determine local currency automatically
- Translation support
Note: This plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed on your server. Alternatively, ask your web host to check and upgrade your PHP.
***
You can install the plugin from your WP admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking “Install Now” …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, you can get to the plugin’s settings page by selecting Currencyr from your WordPress admin user area …
The plugin settings area provides several configuration options …
For example, you can select a base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ dropdown menu if you want a different currency than the default option ’USD’ …
Similarly, you can specify any supported data provider from the drop-down menu in the ‘Provider’ section. The default provider is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can select another option, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose ‘Open Exchange Rates’ as your provider, an API (Application Programming Interface) is required …
You can choose how often you would like the exchange rates to update by selecting an option from the ‘Update Rates’ drop-down menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which is an open-source library of Javascript code that allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, simply ignore this section …
Configure the rest of the plugin settings to suit your needs and don’t forget to click Save Changes when finished …
When you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can easily add currency conversion to WP site’s posts and pages using shortcodes and widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the end of this tutorial to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, JPY, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Using Currencyr Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into pages, posts and widgets without editing code using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WP posts and pages:
Let’s say that you retail an item on your site for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display this conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
To display this information, just add the shortcode below to your post or page …
Note: You can also add pricing in dollars and cents (e.g. 155.25, 22.00, 1356.87, etc …)
The example below shows how your shortcode will look after you have added it to the post or page …
Once the page has been published, the currency conversion will then display like this …
Using the above example, let’s now convert the same price into different currency formats.
To do this, use following shortcode (you can add as many currency symbols as you want by using vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode appears when added to a post …
After publishing the page or post, the converted currency amounts will then display like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the end of this tutorial to learn how to change the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you want to specify a different base currency than the one set as your default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to customers in countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below now shows how the above shortcode appears when you add it to your content …
After publishing the information, your currency conversion will then display as shown in the example below …
Widget
You can also add a currency converter to your website or blog’s sidebar area using the Currencyr widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar area, select Appearance > Widgets from your WordPress user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to the ‘Active Widgets’ location …
Configure the widget settings as shown below (add currency codes separated by commas), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter will now appear on your website’s sidebar with the settings you have specified when configuring the widget …
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 change the symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by a forward slash as you can see in the screenshot below …
If you choose another symbol and resave your plugin settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
WordPress E-Commerce
As mentioned earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with a number of WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
And there you have it! Now you know how to easily add a currency converter to your e-commerce site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
***
"Learning WordPress has been a huge stumbling block for me. I've been looking for something that covers absolutely everything but doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Thank you so much ... you have just provided me with what I have been looking for! Truly appreciated!" - Tanya