Are you planning to set up an e-commerce site, or sell products to a foreign market? If so, then it’s a great idea to consider providing your prospects with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce website.
Currency converting tools let your visitors translate international currency prices into their local currency when purchasing products on e-commerce sites. It also allows your visitors to see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their local currency.
One benefit of displaying currency conversion is that it allows visitors to see and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own home currency, and makes it easier for purchasers to work out their costs and expenses.
If your site is built with WordPress, it’s really easy and simple to add currency conversion via a plugin to your web site, allowing your visitors to easily calculate the cost of your products.
Currencyr – WP Free Currency Conversion Plugin
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, 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 site.
Some of the many features of this plugin include:
- In-line converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Google and European Central Bank
- Support database cache driven for fast response
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with various e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically detects local currency
- Supports full translations
Note: The Currencyr plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed. Alternatively, ask your web host to update your PHP server installation.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WordPress admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking “Install Now” …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can access the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings section provides various configuration settings …
For example, you can select a base currency from the Base Currency dropdown menu if you want a different currency than the default option ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
Similarly, you can specify which data provider you want to use from the dropdown menu in the ‘Provider’ section. The default provider is Yahoo Finance, but you can also select another option, such as FoxRate or Google Finance …
Note: If you choose ‘Open Exchange Rates’, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can choose how often you would like to update the exchange rates by specifying an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which is an open-source library of Javascript code that lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, just ignore this setting …
Edit the rest of the settings and remember to click the Save Changes button when you have finished configuring all of your settings …
After your plugin settings have been configured, you can easily start adding currency conversion to any WordPress page using a shortcode.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, ZAR, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Plugin Shortcodes
You can add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets with no web coding knowledge using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to WP pages and posts:
Let’s say that you sell goods for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display the conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To do this, simply add the shortcode below to your post or page …
Note: You can also add pricing in dollars and cents (e.g. 16.95, 79.45, 399.99, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode looks when added to a post or page …
After publishing the page, the currency conversion will appear as shown in the example below …
Using the same example, let’s also convert the same amount into different currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode below (you can add as many currency symbols as you want separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode appears when inserted into a page …
Once your content has been published, the converted currency will then display like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol within this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you want to select a different base currency than the one you have set as your default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to non-European customers (e.g. Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below now shows how the above shortcode appears when inserted into a page …
Once the post or page has been published, your currency conversion will then display as seen in the example below …
How To Use The Plugin Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website’s sidebar menu using a widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar menu, select Appearance > Widgets from your WP admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to an ‘Active Widgets’ area …
Configure the widget options as shown below (add the currency codes you would like displaying on your widget separated by commas), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter will now display on your site’s sidebar menu with the options you have selected …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can change the 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 you can see in the example below …
If you change the symbol and update your settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As mentioned earlier, the plugin can be integrated with a number of WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Shopp …
(image sourced from Currencyr plugin website)
Congratulations! Now you can go and easily add a currency converter to your WordPress site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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