Are you planning to set up a WordPress-based e-commerce site, or sell goods and services worldwide? If so, you should think about providing users with the convenience of currency conversion on your e-commerce web site.
Currency converting software allows your site visitors to convert international currency prices into their local currency at the purchase or checkout stage. It also lets your visitors see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their own local currency.
The obvious benefit of providing currency conversion is that it allows customers to view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If you are a WordPress user, it’s really simple to add currency conversion via a plugin to WordPress, allowing your prospective customers to quickly determine the cost of your goods.
Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter WordPress plugin with a visually attractive converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free!
This useful WP plugin features:
- Inline converter
- Supports various exchange rates providers, like Yahoo!, Open Exchange Rates & FoxRates
- Supports Shortcodes
- Currency table and converter widget
- Can be integrated with a number of online store plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically determines local currency
- Full support for language translations
Important: The Currencyr plugin requires PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not install this plugin if you currently have an older version of PHP installed. Alternatively, ask your web host to update your PHP server installation.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP dashboard by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins screen and clicking “Install Now” …
After the plugin has been installed and activated, you can configure the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your dashboard area …
This takes you to the plugin settings area …
For example, you can choose a base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ drop-down menu. The default base currency is ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
Similarly, you can select which data provider you want to use from a drop-down menu. The default option is Yahoo Finance, but you can also select another option, like FoxRate or Google Finance …
Note: If you choose Open Exchange Rates as your provider, an API (Application Programming Interface) will be required …
You can choose how often you would like the exchange rates to update by choosing an option from the Update Rates drop-down menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (such as WordPress plugins).
Unless there is a reason to change the jQuery settings, you can simply ignore this section …
Configure the remainder of the plugin settings and don’t forget to click the ‘Save Changes’ button when done …
When you have configured your settings, you can easily add currency conversion to all of your WordPress website’s posts or pages using shortcodes and widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, AUD, ZAR, etc …) in this plugin.
Using Plugin Shortcodes
You can add currency conversion to pages, posts and widgets with no technical 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 retail goods online for a set price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display the conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
To do this, simply add the shortcode below into your page content …
Note: You can also display amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 175.00, 197.00, 295.75, etc …)
The example below shows how the above shortcode looks once you have inserted it into your product page …
When the page or post has been published, your converted currency will display like this …
Using the same example, let’s now display the same amount into different currency formats.
To do this, use following shortcode (add as many currency symbols as you want by using vertical pipes) …
You can see how the shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
After publishing your post or page, your converted currency amounts will then appear as seen in the screenshot below …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you want to specify a different base currency than the one set as the default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to customers from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The screenshot below now shows how the above shortcode looks when inserted into your content …
Once your page has been published, your currency conversion will then display as you can see below …
How To Use The Currencyr Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website or blog’s sidebar using the plugin’s widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar area, choose Appearance > Widgets from the WordPress 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 to display on your widget separated by a comma), and click Save to save your settings …
Your currency converter will now display on your sidebar with the settings you have specified when configuring the widget …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify a symbol of your choice to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can change the symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings section.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by the forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you enter another symbol and update your plugin settings …
Your website visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
E-Commerce Platform Integration
As stated earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with a number of WP-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Shopp …
(image source: Currencyr plugin website)
And there you have it! 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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