Do you sell products online globally? If so, you should think about providing your web visitors with currency conversion.
Currency conversion software tools allow your site visitors to have the cost of a foreign currency amount converted to their local currency at the purchase or checkout stage. It also allows visitors and customers to view the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own home currency.
The obvious benefit of putting currency conversion on your site is that it allows customers to see and understand prices in foreign countries in their own home currency, making it it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is powered by WordPress, it’s really easy to add currency conversion via a plugin to currency conversion to your WordPress site using a plugin, allowing your visitors to quickly and easily calculate the cost of your goods.
Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WordPress plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
Useful plugin features include:
- In-line converter
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Google, Open Exchange Rates, European Central Bank and FoxRates
- Support database cache driven for fast response
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with various e-store plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatic local currency determination
- Supports full translations
Important: The Currencyr plugin needs your server to be running PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Alternatively, ask your web host to update your PHP.
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You can install the plugin from your WordPress admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the “Install” button …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you can get to the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your dashboard menu …
This takes you to the plugin settings section …
For example, you can choose a base currency from a drop-down menu if you prefer a different currency than the default option ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
You can specify which data provider you want to use from the dropdown menu in the Provider section. The default option is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can choose another provider, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates as your provider, you will need to enter an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can choose how often you would like the exchange rates to be updated by specifying an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which is an open-source library of Javascript code that allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (like WP plugins).
Unless there is a reason to modify the jQuery settings, you can just ignore this option …
Edit the rest of the settings to suit your preferences and click the Save Changes button when done …
After your plugin settings have been configured, you can easily start adding currency conversion to any WP page or post using shortcodes.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, AUD, ZAR, etc …) in this plugin.
Plugin Shortcodes
You can add currency conversion to 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 sell your product for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to show your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To do this, you simply need to add the following shortcode into your post or page …
Note: You can also display prices in dollars and cents (e.g. 89.95, 29.95, 2499.99, etc …)
The example below shows how the above shortcode looks when inserting it into a page …
After the post or page has been published, the converted currency will then display as you can see below …
Using this example, let’s also display the same price into multiple currencies.
To do this, use following shortcode (you can add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
You can see how the above shortcode looks when added to a page …
After publishing the post or page, the converted currency will then appear as shown below …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you would like to select 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 website targeted to visitors from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below shows how the shortcode looks when you add it to a post …
Once your content has been published, the converted currency amounts will then display like this …
Using The Widget
You can also add currency conversion to your website or blog’s sidebar area using a widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar menu, select Appearance > Widgets in the WP user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an Active Widgets area …
Configure the widget options as shown below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter will now show on your website’s sidebar menu with the options you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you 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) …
Separates all your currency values using a forward slash as shown below …
If you choose another symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
Integration With e-Commerce Platforms
As stated earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image sourced from Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you can go and easily add currency conversion to your e-commerce 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)