Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce web site or making products available for sale globally? If so, then it’s a good idea to think about providing users with a currency conversion tool.
Currency conversion software allows your prospects to translate international currency prices to their home currency at the purchase or checkout stage. It also allows your visitors to view the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their local currency.
One advantage of showing currency conversion on your site is that it lets visitors see and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for visitors to work out their costs and expenses.
If your site is built with WordPress, it’s simple to add currency conversion using a plugin to currency conversion to your WP site using a plugin, allowing your prospective customers to easily work out the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – Currency Converting Plugin For WP Sites
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WP plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. It’s also free to install and use on your site.
The Currencyr plugin includes features such as:
- Inline converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Google & European Central Bank
- Support database cache driven for fast response
- Currency table and converter widget
- Supports integration with various online shopping plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically detects local currency
- Translation support
Important: The Currencyr 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 webhosting support team to update your PHP server installation.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP dashboard by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking “Install Now” …
After you have installed and activated the plugin, you can access the plugin’s settings page by choosing Currencyr from your WP admin user menu …
This takes you to the plugin settings area …
For example, you can choose your base currency from the Base Currency dropdown menu if you prefer to use something other than the default option ’United States Dollar’ …
Similarly, you can specify any supported data provider from the dropdown menu in the Provider section. The default option is Yahoo Finance, but you can also choose another provider, 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) will be required …
You can select how often you want the exchange rates to update by choosing an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (like WP plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Edit the rest of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click Save Changes when done …
After you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can easily start adding currency conversion to all of your WordPress site’s posts using widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, JPY, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Plugin Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into WP posts, pages and widgets without touching code using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WordPress posts and pages:
Let’s say that you are selling your products online for a fixed amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to show your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
To display this information, just insert the shortcode below into your page content …
Note: You can also add amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 16.95, 97.00, 544.97, etc …)
The example below shows how the shortcode should look after being added to the post …
After publishing the post, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
Using the above example, let’s also convert the same price into multiple currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode shown below (add as many currency symbols as you want separated by vertical pipes) …
The example below now shows how the above shortcode looks when you add it to a post …
Once the content has been published, the converted currency will then display as seen below …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol with this plugin.
Now, suppose you would like to select a different base currency than the one set as your default.
For example, say you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to non-European customers (like Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the shortcode appears when added to your content …
After publishing the information, the converted currency amounts will then appear like this …
Plugin Widget
You can also add currency conversion to your site’s sidebar area using the Currencyr widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar menu, select Appearance > Widgets from the WordPress admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add 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 converter will now appear on your sidebar menu with the options you have selected …
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 several currencies.
You can change the symbol in the Multiple Separator settings field.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by the forward slash as shown below …
If you enter another symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your web visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
Using The Plugin With WordPress-Compatible e-Commerce Software
As mentioned earlier, the plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Shopp …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
And there you have it! Now you know how to easily add currency conversion to your e-commerce website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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