Are you planning to sell goods and services online to a global customer base? If so, then here’s a good idea: consider providing users with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce web site.
Currency converting software lets your web visitors have the price of an international currency transaction translated into their home currency when purchasing products on e-commerce sites. It also allows your visitors to view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own local currency.
One advantage of adding currency conversion to your site is that it allows visitors to 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 and simple to add a currency conversion plugin to your website or blog, allowing your site visitors to quickly understand the cost of your goods.
WordPress Free Currency Conversion Plugin – Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WordPress plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free to install and use on your website or blog.
Some of the features of this plugin include:
- Inline converter
- Supports several exchange rates providers, like Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & FoxRates
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with various online shopping plugins such as WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatic local currency detection
- Translation support
Important: The Currencyr plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP. Ask your web hosting company to update your PHP server installation.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins screen and clicking “Install Now” …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can get to the plugin’s settings area by choosing Currencyr from your WordPress admin user area …
The plugin settings screen provides various configuration options …
For example, you can select a base currency from a dropdown menu if you prefer to use something other than the default option (USD) …
Similarly, you can choose any supported data provider from a dropdown menu. The default selection is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also select another option, such as FoxRate or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose Open Exchange Rates, an API (Application Programming Interface) is required …
You can specify how frequently you want 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 (e.g. WordPress plugins).
Unless you have a reason to modify the jQuery settings, just ignore this option …
Configure the rest of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click the Save Changes button when finished …
When you have finished configuring your settings, you can start adding currency conversion to your WP posts or pages using widgets.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, CAD, etc …) with this plugin.
How To Use Plugin Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets with no programming knowledge using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to posts and pages:
Let’s say that you are selling an item for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display this price converted into British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To do this, just add the shortcode below into your page content …
Note: You can also display prices in dollars and cents (for example, 155.25, 197.00, 400.00, etc …)
The example below shows how your shortcode should look after you have added it to a product page …
Once your page has been published, the currency conversion will then appear as you can see in the example below …
Using the above example, let’s now convert the same price into multiple currencies.
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 shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
Once the post or page has been published, your converted currency amounts will then display like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you want to specify a different base currency than the one selected as your default.
For example, say you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to customers from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the shortcode looks when you add it to your content …
Once your post or page has been published, the converted currency will then display as seen in the example below …
Currencyr Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website’s sidebar menu using the plugin’s widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets in the WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to an ‘Active Widgets’ location …
Configure the widget options as shown below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click ‘Save’ to save your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now appear on your website’s sidebar menu with the settings 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 change the symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings field.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your prices using the forward slash as you can see in the screenshot below …
If you change this symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
Using The Currencyr Plugin With WP-Compatible e-Commerce Software
As described earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with various WP-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WP-eCommerce and Shopp …
(image source: plugin site)
And there you have it! 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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