Are you planning to sell goods or services online worldwide? If so, then it’s a great idea to consider providing users with a currency conversion tool.
Currency conversion tools let your prospects convert international currency prices to their home currency when purchasing or checking out products on e-commerce sites. It also lets your customers view the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, displayed in their local currency.
One benefit of adding currency conversion to your website is that it allows your customers to view and understand pricing in foreign countries in their own home currency, and makes it easier for customers to work out their costs and expenses.
If your site is built using WordPress, you can add currency conversion using a plugin to currency conversion to WordPress using a plugin, allowing your prospective customers to easily work out the cost of your products.
Currencyr – WP Currency Conversion Plugin
Currencyr is a simple yet advanced, intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a unique and attractive converter tooltip. It’s also free to install and use on your WordPress website.
Some of the useful features of this plugin include the following:
- In-line conversion tool
- Supports several exchange rates providers, such as Yahoo!, Google, Open Exchange Rates, European Central Bank and FoxRates
- WP-Cron task scheduler enabled
- Currency table and converter widget
- Can be integrated with various e-store plugins such as WooCommerce, Shop and Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatic local currency detection
- Translation support
Important: This plugin requires PHP 5.3.0 or later. Do not use this plugin if you are running an older version of PHP on your server. Alternatively, ask your webhosting provider to check and upgrade your PHP server installation if necessary.
***
You can install the plugin from your WordPress admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins section and clicking “Install Now” …
When the plugin has been installed and activated, you can configure the plugin’s settings by choosing Currencyr from your WordPress administration menu …
The plugin settings section offers you many configuration options …
For example, you can choose your base currency from the ‘Base Currency’ drop-down menu. The default option is ‘United States Dollar – (USD)’ …
Similarly, you can choose a data provider from a drop-down menu. The default option is Yahoo Finance, but you can choose another option, 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 specify how often you would like to update the currency exchange rates by choosing an option from the ‘Update Rates’ dropdown menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which is an open-source library of Javascript code that allows web developers to add things like animation effects to web applications (like WordPress plugins).
Unless there is a reason to modify the jQuery settings, simply ignore this setting …
Configure the rest of the plugin settings and click ‘Save Changes’ when done …
When you have finished configuring your plugin settings, you can easily add currency conversion to your WordPress posts using a shortcode.
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section further below to learn how to use currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, JPY, etc …) with this plugin.
Using Currencyr Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to posts, pages and widgets without touching code using shortcodes.
Below are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to your WP pages and posts:
Let’s say that you sell a product online for a fixed price (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display this conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your page.
All you need to do is add the following shortcode to your post or page …
Note: You can also insert pricing in dollars and cents (e.g. 175.00, 97.00, 129.10, etc …)
The screenshot below shows how the shortcode looks after you have added it to a post or page …
After the post has been published, your converted currency amount will appear as seen in the screenshot below …
Using the same example, let’s now display the same price into multiple currency formats.
To do this, use the shortcode below (you can add as many currency symbols as you like by using vertical pipes) …
The screenshot below shows how the above shortcode appears when inserted into your content …
After publishing the page, your converted currency amounts will then display like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn more about changing the currency separator symbol within the Currencyr plugin.
Now, let’s suppose that you want to specify a different base currency than the one selected as your default.
For example, if you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your e-commerce pages targeted to non-European visitors (like Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
The example below now shows how the above shortcode looks when added to a page …
Once your post or page has been published, the converted currency will then display like this …
Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your site’s sidebar section using the Currencyr widget.
To add the currency converter to your sidebar, select Appearance > Widgets from your WordPress dashboard menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets section find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and add it to an ‘Active Widgets’ location …
Configure the widget options as shown in the example below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click ‘Save’ to update your settings …
Your currency converter tool will now appear on your website’s sidebar with the options you have specified …
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 several currencies.
You can change the symbol in the ‘Multiple Separator’ settings section.
So, for example, using the default symbol “/” (forward slash) …
Displays your currency values separated by a forward slash as you can see in the screenshot below …
If you enter another symbol and resave your plugin settings …
Your web visitors will see the new symbol used as the currency separator …
e-Commerce Software Integration
As stated earlier, the Currencyr plugin integrates with a number of WP-compatible e-commerce plugins such as WooCommerce, Shopp and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image source: Currencyr plugin site)
Congratulations! Now you know how to easily add a currency converter to your e-commerce web site.
To learn more about WordPress e-commerce plugins, see the tutorial below:
***
"I love the way your email series "Infinite Web Content Creation Training Series" is documented and presented. It is very absorbing and captivating. The links and tutorials are interesting and educational. This has motivated me to rewrite my content following the concepts I am learning from the email series." - Mani Raju, www.fortuneinewaste.com