Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce site or making products available for sale to an overseas audience? If so, you should consider providing users with the convenience of currency conversion on your site.
Currency conversion software allows your web visitors to convert foreign currency prices into their home currency when checking out products online. It also allows your customers to see the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own local currency.
The obvious benefit of adding currency conversion is that it lets your customers view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own home currency, and makes it easier for customers to work out their costs and expenses.
If your site is built with WordPress, it’s really easy to add a currency conversion plugin to currency conversion to WordPress using a plugin, allowing your customers to easily perform currency conversions to determine the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – Free Currency Converting Tool For WP Sites
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
The Currencyr currency conversion WP plugin includes a number of advanced features such as:
- Inline converter
- Supports a number of exchange rates providers, such as Google, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with various e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically determines local currency
- Support for language translations
Important: The Currencyr plugin requires your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Alternatively, ask your web host to update your PHP.
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You can install the Currencyr plugin from your WP admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking the ”Install Now” button …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your WordPress admin user area …
This takes you to the plugin settings screen …
For example, you can select a base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ dropdown menu. The default option is ‘USD’ …
Similarly, you can choose a data provider from the drop-down menu in the ‘Provider’ section. The default option is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can choose one of the other options, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can choose how frequently you want the exchange rates to update by choosing an option from the ‘Update Rates’ drop-down menu …
The 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. WP plugins).
If you have no reason to edit the jQuery settings, leave them as they are …
Edit the rest of the plugin settings to suit your own preferences and remember to click the ‘Save Changes’ button when you have configured all of your settings …
When you have configured your settings, you can add currency conversion to any WordPress post or page using shortcodes.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, ZAR, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Plugin Shortcodes
You can easily insert currency conversion into posts, pages and widgets without having to mess with code using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WP posts and pages:
Let’s say that you sell goods online for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to show the conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your product sales page.
To display this information, you simply need to add the following shortcode into your page content …
Note: You can also add pricing in dollars and cents (e.g. 89.95, 29.95, 544.97, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode should look after being added to the product page …
Once the page or post has been published, the currency conversion will then display like this …
Using the same example, let’s also translate 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 screenshot below now shows how the above shortcode appears when inserted into your content …
Once the page has been published, the converted currency will then display as shown in the example below …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you would like to specify a different base currency than the one you have selected as your default.
For example, say you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your website targeted to customers in countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the shortcode appears when inserted into a page …
Once the information has been published, your currency conversion will then display like this …
How To Use The Currencyr Widget
You can also add a currency converter to your site’s sidebar using the Currencyr widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar area, select Appearance > Widgets from your WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to the ‘Active Widgets’ location …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the example below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter will now appear on your sidebar with the options you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify a symbol of your choice to display as the currency separator when using several 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 change the symbol and resave your settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
Using The Plugin With WordPress-Compatible e-Commerce Software
As mentioned earlier, the plugin can be integrated with a number of WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: plugin website)
Congratulations! 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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