Do you plan to set up an e-commerce site, or sell goods globally? If so, then you should probably consider providing users with currency conversion.
Currency conversion allows your prospective customers to convert international currency prices to their home currency at the point of sale. It also lets customers see the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their own home currency.
The obvious advantage of adding currency conversion is that it allows visitors to view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for customers to work out their costs and expenses.
Fortunately, if you are a WordPress user, it’s easy and simple to add currency conversion via a plugin to WordPress, allowing your prospective customers to easily understand the cost of your products.
WP Currency Converter – Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WP plugin with a unique converter tooltip. It’s also free to install and use on your WP web site.
This plugin features:
- In-line conversion tool
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Google & European Central Bank
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Currency table and converter widget
- Can be integrated with various e-store plugins such as WP-eCommerce & Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can detect local currency automatically
- Supports full language translations
Note: This 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 on your server. Ask your web host to upgrade your PHP.
***
You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WordPress admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins section and clicking “Install Now” …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can access the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your dashboard menu …
The plugin settings area provides many configuration options …
For example, you can choose a base currency from a dropdown menu if you want something other than the default option ’USD’ …
You can also select which data provider you want to use from the drop-down menu in the Provider section. The default selection is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can select one of the other options, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose Open Exchange Rates as your provider, you will need to enter an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can select how often you want the currency exchange rates to be updated by specifying an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (such as WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, you can just ignore this option …
Configure the remainder of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click ‘Save Changes’ when finished …
After you have configured your settings, you can start adding currency conversion to any WP post using shortcodes and widgets.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, AUD, JPY, etc …) in this plugin.
Shortcodes
You can easily insert currency conversion into pages, posts and widgets with no coding skills using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to WP pages and posts:
Let’s say that you retail your product on your website for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display this price converted into British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
All you need to do is add the shortcode below into your post or page …
Note: You can also display amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 155.25, 97.00, 544.97, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how your shortcode will look when added to your post …
After publishing your post or page, your currency conversion will then appear like this …
Using the same example, let’s now display the same amount into different currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode shown below (you can add as many currency symbols as you want separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the shortcode looks when inserted into your content …
Once the page has been published, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol within the Currencyr plugin.
Now, suppose you would like to select a different base currency than the one set as the default.
For example, say you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to non-European visitors (e.g. Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the above shortcode looks when you add it to your content …
Once the post has been published, the converted currency will then appear like this …
Widget
You can also insert currency conversion into your website or blog’s sidebar section using the plugin’s widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets from your WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an ‘Active Widgets’ area …
Configure the widget settings as shown below (add currency codes separated by commas), and click Save to save your settings …
The currency converter will now appear on your 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 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 shown below …
If you select another symbol and resave your plugin settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
Integration With e-Commerce Platforms
As stated earlier, the plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: plugin site)
And there you have it! Now you can go and easily add currency conversion to your WordPress website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
***
"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)