Are you planning to set up an e-commerce website, or sell any products worldwide? If so, then here’s a good idea: think about providing your potential customers with currency conversion.
Currency conversion software allows your prospects to have the cost of a foreign currency transaction translated to their local currency at the point of sale. It also lets visitors view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their own local currency.
One great advantage of displaying currency conversion on your website is that it allows customers to see and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for customers to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is powered by WordPress, it’s easy to add a currency converter to currency conversion to your web site via a plugin, allowing your prospective customers to quickly calculate the cost of your products.
WP Free Currency Converting Plugin – Currencyr
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
This useful plugin includes a number of advanced features such as:
- In-line conversion tool
- Supports various exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & FoxRates
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with various online store plugins like WooCommerce, Shop & Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically detects local currency
- Translation support
Important: The Currencyr plugin requires 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. Alternatively, ask your webhosting provider to check and upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WordPress dashboard 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 administration navigation menu …
The plugin settings section provides a number of configuration settings …
For example, you can select your base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ drop-down menu. The default option is ‘USD’ …
You can select any supported data provider from a drop-down menu. The default provider is Yahoo Finance, but you can select another option, like European Central Bank or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can select how frequently you want the exchange rates to be updated by selecting an option from the ‘Update Rates’ drop-down menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (e.g. WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Edit the remainder of the plugin settings and remember to click the Save Changes button when finished …
When your plugin settings have been configured, you can add currency conversion to WordPress pages using shortcodes.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, ZAR, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Using Shortcodes
You can easily insert currency conversion into WP posts, pages and widgets without touching your web templates using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to WordPress pages and posts:
Let’s say that you retail goods for a set price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would like to display your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your product sales page.
To display this information, you simply need to insert the shortcode below to your page content …
Note: You can also insert prices in dollars and cents (for example, 89.95, 189.00, 1356.87, etc …)
The example below shows how the above shortcode will look after being inserted into a product page …
When your page has been published, the converted currency amount will then display like this …
Using the above example, let’s now convert the same price into different currencies.
To do this, use the shortcode below (add as many currency symbols as you want separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
After publishing the post, the currency conversion will then display as you can see below …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you would like to specify 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 website targeted to non-European visitors (e.g. Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
You can see how the above shortcode looks when you add it to a page …
Once your content has been published, the converted currency amounts will then appear like this …
Currencyr Widget
You can also insert currency conversion into your website’s sidebar using the plugin’s widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets from the WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an Active Widgets location …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the screenshot below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to save your settings …
The currency converter tool will now show on your sidebar with the settings 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 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 shown below …
If you change the symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your website visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Platform Integration
As mentioned earlier, the plugin can be integrated with various WP-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, Shopp and Easy Digital Downloads …
(above image sourced from Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you can go and easily add currency conversion to your WordPress site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)