Are you planning to set up an e-commerce site, or sell products to an overseas customer base? If so, then you should think about providing your potential customers with a currency conversion service.
Currency converting software tools allow your web visitors to translate international currency amounts to their local currency at the buying or checkout stage. It also allows your visitors to see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own home currency.
The obvious advantage of adding currency conversion to your website is that it allows your customers to view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for customers to calculate their costs and expenses.
Fortunately, if you are a WordPress user, you can add currency conversion using a plugin to your WP site, allowing your visitors to quickly and easily understand the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – Currency Converting Tool For WordPress
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. And, it’s free to install and use on your site.
The Currencyr useful WP plugin includes practical features such as:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports several 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 store plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can detect local currency automatically
- Full support for language translations
Note: This plugin requires PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP. Alternatively, ask your web hosting support team to upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the plugin from your WordPress dashboard by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking the ”Install Now” button …
After you have installed and activated the plugin, you can get to the plugin’s settings screen by choosing Currencyr from your WP admin user menu …
The plugin settings screen offers you a number of configuration settings …
For example, you can choose your base currency from a dropdown menu. The default currency is ’USD’ …
Similarly, you can choose which data provider you want to use from the dropdown menu in the Provider section. The default selection is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can select one of the other options, like FoxRate or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose ‘Open Exchange Rates’, an API (Application Programming Interface) will be required …
You can specify how frequently you want the exchange rates to update by choosing an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (like WP plugins).
Unless you have a reason to edit the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Configure the remainder of the settings to suit your preferences and click ‘Save Changes’ when you have configured this screen …
After you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can start adding currency conversion to your WordPress website’s posts using widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, ZAR, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Using Currencyr Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets with no web coding knowledge using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to pages and posts:
Let’s say that you are selling a product online 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.
All you need to do is insert the following shortcode into your post or page …
Note: You can also add prices in dollars and cents (e.g. 16.95, 37.95, 149.00, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode should look when added to the page …
After publishing your page or post, the currency conversion will then appear as seen in the example below …
Using this example, let’s also translate the same price into different currencies.
To do this, use following shortcode (add as many currency symbols as you want separated by vertical pipes) …
The screenshot below now shows how the shortcode looks when inserted into your content …
After publishing the post or page, your currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol with the Currencyr plugin.
Now, let’s say that you want to use a different base currency than the one you have set as your default.
For example, say you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to visitors from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the shortcode appears when added to your content …
After publishing the post or page, your currency conversion will then appear like this …
Using The Plugin Widget
You can also insert currency conversion into your website or blog’s sidebar using the Currencyr widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets from your WordPress dashboard menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to an ‘Active Widgets’ area …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the screenshot below (add any currency codes you want displaying on your widget separated by commas), and click ‘Save’ to save your settings …
The currency converter will now appear on your site’s sidebar with the settings you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify a symbol of your choice 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) …
Displays your currency values separated by the forward slash as shown below …
If you change the symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your web visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As mentioned earlier, the plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add currency conversion to your WordPress site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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