Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce website or selling products to a global customer base? If so, then you should think about providing users with currency conversion.
Currency converting software allows your prospects to convert foreign currency amounts to their home currency when checking out products on e-commerce sites. It also allows customers to view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their local currency.
The obvious benefit of showing currency conversion is that it allows your customers to view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for purchasers to calculate their costs and expenses.
Fortunately, if you are a WordPress user, it’s easy and simple to add currency conversion via a plugin to currency conversion to your WP website or blog via a plugin, allowing your prospective customers to quickly perform currency conversions to determine the cost of your products.
Currencyr
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free to install and use on your WP website or blog.
Some of the features of this great plugin include the following:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports several exchange rates providers, like Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates and European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Currency table and converter widget
- Supports integration with various e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce and Shopp.
- Automatic local currency determination
- Full language translation support
Note: This plugin needs PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP. Ask your webhosting company to upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP dashboard by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking the “Install” button …
After you have installed and activated the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your admin area …
This takes you to the plugin settings page …
For example, you can choose your base currency from a dropdown menu if you want something other than the default option ’United States Dollar’ …
You can also choose any supported data provider from the dropdown menu in the Provider section. The default selection is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can also choose another option, such as FoxRate or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose ‘Open Exchange Rates’ as your provider, an API (Application Programming Interface) is required …
You can select how frequently you want to update the exchange rates by selecting an option from the Update Rates drop-down 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 edit the jQuery settings, leave this option alone …
Edit the remainder of the settings and don’t forget to click Save Changes when finished …
Once you have configured your plugin settings, you can add currency conversion to your WordPress posts or pages using a shortcode.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, GBP, CAD, etc …) with the Currencyr plugin.
Using Plugin Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to pages, posts and widgets with no coding skills or knowledge using shortcodes.
Let’s take a look at some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to pages and posts:
Let’s say that you are selling an item online for a set amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display your price converted into British pounds (GBP) on your page.
All you need to do is insert the shortcode below into your page content …
Note: You can also display prices in dollars and cents (e.g. 6.95, 79.45, 1356.87, etc …)
The example below shows how the shortcode looks after being inserted into a post or page …
When your post has been published, your converted currency amount will then appear like this …
Using this example, let’s now convert the same price into multiple currency formats.
To do this, use following shortcode (add as many currency symbols as you like separated by vertical pipes) …
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode appears when added to your content …
After publishing your page, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol within this plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you want to use a different base currency than the one selected as the default.
For example, say 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 …
You can see how the above shortcode looks when you add it to a page …
After publishing the page or post, your converted currency amounts will then appear like this …
How To Use The Plugin Widget
You can also add a currency converter to your site’s sidebar menu using the plugin’s widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar area, choose Appearance > Widgets in your WP dashboard menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to the Active Widgets location …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the screenshot below (add currency codes separated by commas), and click Save to update your settings …
The currency converter will now appear on your site’s sidebar menu with the options you have selected …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin allows you to specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can select a different symbol in the Multiple Separator settings field.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Separates all your currency values using the forward slash as you can see in the screenshot below …
If you modify the symbol and resave your settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol display as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Integration
As stated earlier, the plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin website)
Congratulations! Now you can go and easily add currency conversion to your WordPress site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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