Are you planning to sell your products online globally? If so, then you may want to think about providing users with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce site.
Currency converting software allows your web visitors to convert international currency prices to their local currency when purchasing products on e-commerce sites. It also allows visitors to view the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their own local currency.
The obvious advantage of displaying currency conversion is that it allows your customers to view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own home currency, making it it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is built using WordPress, you can add currency conversion via a plugin to WordPress, allowing your prospective customers to quickly and easily work out the cost of your products.
WordPress Free Currency Conversion Plugin – Currencyr
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
Plugin features include the following:
- In-line conversion tool
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Google, Open Exchange Rates & FoxRates
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Currency table and converter widget
- Can be integrated with a number of e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce & Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can detect local currency automatically
- Support for language translations
Important: This plugin needs your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use 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 server installation if required.
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You can install the plugin from your WordPress admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the ”Install Now” button …
When the plugin has been installed and activated, you can access the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings area offers you various configuration settings …
For example, you can choose a base currency from a drop-down menu. The default currency is ’United States Dollar’ …
Similarly, you can choose which data provider you want to use from the drop-down menu in the Provider section. The default provider is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also select another provider, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates, you will need to obtain an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can select how often you want the exchange rates to update by specifying an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (such as WordPress plugins).
Unless there is a reason to edit the jQuery settings, you can just ignore this option …
Edit the rest of the plugin settings according to your own needs and remember to click ‘Save Changes’ when done …
When your plugin settings have been configured, you can start adding currency conversion to any WP post or page using shortcodes.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, CAD, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Using Currencyr Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into WP pages, posts and widgets without having to mess with code using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WordPress posts and pages:
Let’s say that you sell an item for a set price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display the conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To display this information, you simply need to insert the shortcode below to your page content …
Note: You can also add prices in dollars and cents (for example, 19.95, 189.00, 2499.99, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the shortcode will look when added to a post or page …
After your information has been published, the currency conversion will then display like this …
Using this 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 like separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the shortcode appears when added to a page …
Once the content has been published, your converted currency will then display like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol with this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you would like to select a different base currency than the one you have selected as your default.
For example, if you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to non-European visitors (for example, Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The screenshot below now shows how the shortcode appears when added to a post …
After publishing your information, the currency conversion will then display as you can see below …
Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website’s sidebar section using the Currencyr widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar menu, select Appearance > Widgets in the WP admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to the Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget options as shown below (add the currency codes you would like to display on your widget separated by a comma), and click Save to save your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now appear on the sidebar with the settings you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using multiple 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 shown below …
If you enter another symbol and resave your plugin settings …
Your website visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Software Integration
As stated earlier, the plugin integrates with a number of WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Shopp …
(above image sourced from Currencyr plugin website)
Congratulations! Now you know how to 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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