Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce website or selling products to an overseas audience? If so, then you should probably consider providing your prospects with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce site.
Currency conversion lets your prospects have the price of an international currency amount translated to their home currency when checking out products online. It also allows visitors to see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their own home currency.
One advantage of adding currency conversion is that it allows visitors to view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for visitors to work out their costs and expenses.
If you are a WordPress user, you can add a currency converter to currency conversion to WordPress using a plugin, allowing your visitors to easily perform currency conversions to determine the cost of your products.
Currencyr – Currency Converting Tool For WordPress
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WP plugin with a unique converter tooltip. And, it’s also free!
The Currencyr useful WP plugin features:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports various exchange rates providers, like Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Currency table and converter widget
- Can be integrated with various e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically determines local currency
- Translation support
Important: The Currencyr plugin requires PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed. Alternatively, ask your web hosting provider to update your PHP.
***
You can install the plugin from your WordPress dashboard by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking “Install Now” …
After you have installed and activated the plugin, you can get to the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your WP dashboard navigation menu …
The plugin settings section provides several configuration settings …
For example, you can select your base currency from a drop-down menu. The default option is ’USD’ …
Similarly, you can choose which data provider you want to use from a dropdown menu. The default provider is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also choose 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 to update the exchange rates by choosing an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The Currencyr 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 modify the jQuery settings, leave them as they are …
Edit the remainder of the settings and don’t forget to click Save Changes when you have finished configuring this page …
When your plugin settings have been configured, you can add currency conversion to WP posts using widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, JPY, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
How To Use Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into WP pages, posts and widgets without touching your web templates using shortcodes.
Here are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to WordPress posts and pages:
Let’s say that you sell your product for a fixed amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display this conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To display this information, you will need to insert the shortcode below to your page content …
Note: You can also insert pricing in dollars and cents (for example, 155.25, 37.95, 295.75, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode looks after you have inserted it into a page or post …
When your post or page has been published, the converted currency amount will then appear like this …
Using this example, let’s now translate the same amount into different currencies.
To do this, use the shortcode below (add as many currency symbols as you like by using vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
After publishing the post, the converted currency will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol with the Currencyr plugin.
Now, suppose you want to select a different base currency than the one selected as the 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 customers (like Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the shortcode appears when added to a page …
Once the page has been published, the currency conversion will then display like this …
Currencyr Widget
You can also add currency conversion to your site’s sidebar menu using the Currencyr widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets in the WP 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 currency codes separated by commas), and click ‘Save’ to save your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now appear on your website’s sidebar with the options you have selected …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you 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, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your prices with the forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you change the symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your website visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
Using The Currencyr Plugin With WP-Compatible e-Commerce Software
As described earlier, the Currencyr plugin can be integrated with various WP-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin website)
And there you have it! Now you can go and easily add a currency converter to your WordPress website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
***
"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group