Do you plan to set up an e-commerce website, or sell products online? If so, you should probably consider providing users with currency conversion.
Currency conversion lets your prospective customers have the cost of an international currency transaction translated to their home currency at the point of sale. It also allows visitors to view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their own home currency.
The obvious advantage of providing currency conversion is that it lets your customers see and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own local currency, making it it easier for customers to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is built with WordPress, it’s easy to add currency conversion via a plugin to your web site, allowing your customers to quickly and easily perform currency conversions to determine the cost of your goods.
Currencyr – WordPress Currency Converter
Currencyr is a simple, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. And, it’s free to install and use on your WP site.
Some of the many features of this great plugin include the following:
- Inline conversion tool
- Supports a number of exchange rates providers, like Google, Open Exchange Rates and European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with a number of e-store plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Can determine local currency automatically
- Translation support
Important: This 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 webhosting provider to check and upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP admin area by typing in “currencyr” into the Plugins search field and clicking “Install Now” …
Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you can visit the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your dashboard area …
This takes you to the plugin settings area …
For example, you can select your base currency from a drop-down menu if you want something other than the default option ’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 also select another provider, like European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you select Open Exchange Rates, you will need to enter an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can choose how often you want the currency exchange rates to be updated by choosing an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The Currencyr plugin uses jQuery, which 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, you can simply ignore this section …
Configure the remainder of the plugin settings and remember to click Save Changes when done …
When you have finished configuring your settings, you can easily add currency conversion to any WP page or post using a shortcode.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, ZAR, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Shortcodes
You can easily insert currency conversion into WP posts, pages and widgets with no programming 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 sell your products for a fixed amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you want to display your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
All you need to do is insert the following shortcode into your page content …
Note: You can also display amounts in dollars and cents (e.g. 89.95, 79.45, 399.99, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the shortcode looks when inserting it into your page …
When your page has been published, the converted currency amount will then display as seen in the screenshot below …
Using this example, let’s also translate the same price into multiple 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 above shortcode looks when added to a post …
After publishing your content, your currency conversion will then appear like this …
refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to change the currency separator symbol in this plugin.
Now, suppose you want to use a different base currency than the one set as the default.
For example, if you have specified your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your website targeted to customers from countries like Australia or Canada, you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the above shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
Once the page has been published, your currency conversion will then appear like this …
Using The Plugin Widget
You can also add a currency converter to your site’s sidebar using the plugin’s widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets in the WordPress 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 appear on your website’s sidebar 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 lets you specify the symbol to display as the currency separator when using multiple currencies.
You can select a different symbol in the Multiple Separator settings section.
So, for example, entering the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by a forward slash as shown below …
If you modify this symbol and resave your settings …
Your web visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
Integration With WP e-Commerce Software
As mentioned earlier, the plugin integrates with various WordPress-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add currency conversion to your WordPress web site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
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