Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce web site or making products available for sale worldwide? If so, you should probably think about providing your prospects with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce site.
Currency converting software allows your site visitors to convert international currency pricing to their local currency when purchasing or checking out products online. It also lets customers view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their home currency.
One great advantage of adding currency conversion to your site is that it lets customers view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own home currency, making it it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If you are a WordPress user, it’s quite easy to add a currency conversion plugin to your WP web site, allowing your visitors to easily work out the cost of your goods.
Currencyr
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WP plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. It’s also free!
The Currencyr currency conversion WP plugin features:
- In-line converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, such as Google, Open Exchange Rates and European Central Bank
- Support database cache driven for fast response
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Supports integration with a number of e-store plugins such as WooCommerce & Shopp.
- Automatically determines local currency
- Translation support
Note: This plugin needs 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 support team to update your PHP.
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You can install the Currencyr plugin from your WP admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking “Install Now” …
After you have installed and activated the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings screen offers you various configuration settings …
For example, you can select your base currency from a drop-down menu if you prefer something other than the default option ’USD’ …
You can also select any supported data provider from the drop-down menu in the Provider section. The default option is Yahoo Finance, but you can select one of the other options, like European Central Bank 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 would like to update the currency exchange rates 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 lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (like WordPress plugins).
If you have no reason to change the jQuery settings, simply ignore this setting …
Edit the rest of the settings to suit your own preferences and don’t forget to click Save Changes when done …
When you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can start adding currency conversion to WordPress posts and pages using shortcodes and widgets.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, CAD, etc …) in this plugin.
Using Currencyr Shortcodes
You can insert currency conversion into pages, posts and widgets without editing code using shortcodes.
Here are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WP posts and pages:
Let’s say that you retail a product online for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to show the conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
To do this, just insert the following shortcode into your page content …
Note: You can also add prices in dollars and cents (for example, 89.95, 97.00, 544.97, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the shortcode should look when added to your page or post …
When the post or page has been published, the currency conversion will then display as seen below …
Using the same example, let’s also display the same price into multiple currencies.
To do this, use the shortcode shown below (you can add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
The example below shows how the shortcode appears when added to a page …
After publishing the page, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the end of this tutorial to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol in the Currencyr plugin.
Now, let’s say that you want to select a different base currency than the one selected as the default.
For example, if you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to visitors in countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below now shows how the shortcode appears when added to a post …
Once the information has been published, your converted currency will then display as you can see in the example below …
Widget
You can also insert currency conversion into your site’s sidebar using a widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar, choose Appearance > Widgets from the WP admin 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 below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click Save to save your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now display on your site’s sidebar menu with the options you have specified when configuring the widget …
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 several currencies.
You can select a different symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency amounts using a forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you choose another symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
WP E-Commerce
As mentioned earlier, the plugin can be integrated with a number of WordPress-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 know how to easily add a currency converter to your e-commerce site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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