Do you plan to sell products online internationally? If so, you should probably think about providing your prospects with currency conversion.
Currency conversion tools allow your prospective customers to have the cost of an international currency transaction translated to their home currency at the point of sale. It also allows customers to view the exact amount their card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own home currency.
The obvious advantage of adding currency conversion is that it allows visitors to see and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for purchasers to calculate their costs and expenses.
Fortunately, if you are a WordPress user, you can add currency conversion using a plugin to your site, allowing your prospective customers to quickly calculate the cost of your goods.
Currencyr
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, 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 site.
This useful plugin features:
- In-line converter
- Supports a number of exchange rates providers, such as Google, Open Exchange Rates and European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with various online store plugins such as WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatic local currency detection
- Translation support
Important: The Currencyr plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed. Ask your web host to check and upgrade your PHP server installation if needed.
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You can install the plugin from your WP admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the “Install” button …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your dashboard navigation menu …
The plugin settings page provides many configuration settings …
For example, you can select your base currency from a drop-down menu if you prefer to use something other than the default option ’US Dollar’ …
You can also choose which data provider you want to use from a dropdown menu. The default option is Yahoo Finance, but you can also choose another provider, like European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can choose how frequently you would like the currency exchange rates to update by selecting 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).
Unless you have a reason to modify the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Edit the rest of the settings and remember to click Save Changes when you have finished configuring all the settings in this screen …
After your plugin settings have been configured, you can easily start adding currency conversion to any WordPress post using shortcodes.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, JPY, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Currencyr Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets without editing code using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WordPress posts and pages:
Let’s say that you retail a product online for a set price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To display this information, just add the shortcode below into your page content …
Note: You can also insert amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 16.95, 37.95, 295.75, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the shortcode looks after being inserted into the post …
After publishing the page, the currency conversion will appear as shown in the example below …
Using the above 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 appears when inserted into your content …
After publishing your post or page, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol within the Currencyr plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you would like to select a different base currency than the one you have selected as the default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your website targeted to customers in countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
You can see how the shortcode appears when inserted into a page …
Once the page or post has been published, the converted currency will then appear as shown below …
Currencyr Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your site’s sidebar using the Currencyr 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 drag it to the ‘Active Widgets’ area …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the example below (add any currency codes you want displaying on your widget separated by commas), and click ‘Save’ to save your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now display on your sidebar menu with the settings you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
This section contains additional information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using several currencies.
You can change the symbol in the Multiple Separator settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your prices with a forward slash as shown below …
If you choose another symbol and resave your plugin settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Software Integration
As stated earlier, the plugin can be integrated with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: plugin site)
And there you have it! Now you know how to easily add a currency converter to your WordPress website.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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