Are you planning to set up an e-commerce website, or sell your products internationally? If so, then you should consider providing users with currency conversion.
Currency conversion software allows your prospects to convert international currency prices into their home currency at the point of sale. It also allows visitors to view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their local currency.
One great benefit of adding currency conversion to your website is that it lets visitors see and understand prices 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 powered by WordPress, you can add currency conversion using a plugin to currency conversion to your WP web site using a plugin, allowing your visitors to quickly and easily understand the cost of your goods.
WP Currency Conversion Plugin – Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WordPress plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. And, it’s completely free!
The Currencyr currency conversion plugin includes features like the following:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with a number of online shopping plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically detects local currency
- Full support for language translations
Note: This plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Ask your web host to check and upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the Currencyr plugin from your WordPress dashboard by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking “Install Now” …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can visit the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings page provides a number of configuration settings …
For example, you can choose a base currency from a dropdown menu. The default base currency is ’USD’ …
Similarly, you can specify any supported data provider from the drop-down menu in the Provider section. The default provider is Yahoo Finance, but you can also select one of the other options, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates as your provider, an API (Application Programming Interface) is required …
You can select how frequently you want to update the currency exchange rates by specifying 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 (like WP plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, leave them as they are …
Edit the rest of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click the ‘Save Changes’ button when finished …
Once you have configured your plugin settings, you can easily start adding currency conversion to any WordPress page using a shortcode.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, CAD, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Currencyr Shortcodes
You can add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets with no web coding skills or knowledge using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WP posts and pages:
Let’s say that you are selling a product for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to show your price converted into British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
All you need to do is insert the following shortcode into your post or page …
Note: You can also add amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 6.95, 22.00, 400.00, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode should look once you have inserted it into the post …
After your information has been published, the currency conversion will then display as you can see below …
Using the same example, let’s also convert the same price into different currency formats.
To do this, use following shortcode (add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode appears when added to a page …
Once the page or post has been published, the currency conversion will then display like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the end of this tutorial to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol within the Currencyr plugin.
Now, let’s say that you want to use a different base currency than the one selected 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 customers from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode looks when added to your content …
After publishing the information, the converted currency will then appear as you can see below …
Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your site’s sidebar using the Currencyr widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar area, choose Appearance > Widgets in your WP admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget options as shown in the example below (add currency codes separated by commas), and click ‘Save’ to update your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now show on your website’s sidebar with the settings you have selected …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify a symbol of your choice to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can change the symbol in the Multiple Separator settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by the forward slash as you can see in the screenshot below …
If you change the symbol and resave your settings …
Your website visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As stated earlier, the Currencyr plugin can be integrated with a number of WP-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image sourced from Currencyr plugin website)
And there you have it! 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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