Do you plan to set up an e-commerce web site, or sell your products worldwide? If so, then it’s a great idea to think about providing your prospects with currency conversion.
Currency conversion software lets your visitors have the price of a foreign currency transaction translated to their home currency when checking out products on e-commerce sites. It also lets your customers view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their local currency.
One advantage of adding currency conversion to your website is that it lets visitors view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for customers to work out their costs and expenses.
If your site is built using WordPress, it’s quite simple to add currency conversion using a plugin to WordPress, allowing your customers to quickly determine the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – Currency Converting Tool For WP Web Sites
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. It’s also free to install and use on your website or blog.
This useful WP plugin features:
- In-line converter
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & FoxRates
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with various e-store plugins like WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can detect local currency automatically
- Translation support
Important: This plugin needs 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 webhosting support team to check and upgrade your PHP server installation.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WordPress admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the ”Install Now” button …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, you can access the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your admin menu …
This takes you to the plugin settings screen …
For example, you can choose a base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ dropdown menu if you prefer something other than the default option ’United States Dollar’ …
You can select which data provider you want to use from the dropdown menu in the ‘Provider’ section. The default provider is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can choose one of the other options, like European Central Bank or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose Open Exchange Rates, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can select how frequently you would like to update the exchange rates by selecting an option from the Update Rates dropdown menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (such as WP plugins).
Unless you have a reason to modify the jQuery settings, simply ignore this section …
Configure the remainder of the settings and don’t forget to click ‘Save Changes’ when you have finished configuring this screen …
When you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can easily add currency conversion to any of your WordPress site’s posts or pages using shortcodes.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, AUD, CAD, etc …) in this plugin.
Using Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into posts, pages and widgets without editing your web templates using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to pages and posts:
Let’s say that you sell a product online for a set price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your product sales page.
To do this, just add the shortcode below into your post or page …
Note: You can also insert prices in dollars and cents (for example, 175.00, 47.00, 2499.99, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how your shortcode will look after being added to a post or page …
After publishing your post, the currency conversion will appear like this …
Using this example, let’s now convert the same amount into multiple currencies.
To do this, use following shortcode (you can add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the shortcode appears when inserted into your content …
After publishing your information, your converted currency will then appear like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the end of this tutorial to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you want to select a different base currency than the one selected as the default.
For example, say you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your website targeted to non-European customers (for example, Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
You can see how the shortcode appears when added to your content …
After publishing your information, your currency conversion will then appear as shown in the example below …
Plugin Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website or blog’s sidebar using a widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar, choose Appearance > Widgets in the WordPress dashboard menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to the Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget settings as shown below (add the currency codes you would like to display on your widget separated by a comma), and click ‘Save’ to update your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now appear on the sidebar menu with the options you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can select a different symbol in the Multiple Separator settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency amounts using a forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you modify the symbol and resave your settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
Integration With e-Commerce Platforms
As described earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, Shopp and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image sourced from plugin website)
Congratulations! Now you can go and easily add currency conversion to your e-commerce web site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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