Are you thinking about setting up an e-commerce website or selling products internationally? If so, then you should think about providing users with a currency conversion tool.
Currency conversion allows your visitors to have the price of an international currency amount converted to their home currency when purchasing or checking out products online. It also lets visitors and customers see the exact amount their credit card or PayPal account will be charged, expressed in their home currency.
The obvious advantage of adding currency conversion is that it allows your customers to view and understand prices in foreign countries in their own local currency, and makes it easier for visitors to calculate their costs and expenses.
If your site is built using WordPress, it’s simple to add a currency conversion plugin to currency conversion to WordPress via a plugin, allowing your site visitors to easily calculate the cost of your goods.
Currencyr
Currencyr is an intuitive, easy-to-use and complete currency converter plugin with a beautiful and unique converter tooltip. Best of all, it’s free to install and use on your WP website.
This currency conversion WordPress plugin includes many features like the following:
- Inline converter
- Supports several exchange rates providers, like Google, Open Exchange Rates & European Central Bank
- Supports Shortcodes
- Widgetized currency table and converter
- Can be integrated with a number of e-store plugins like WooCommerce, Shop & Easy Digital Downloads.
- Automatically detects local currency
- Supports full translations
Note: This plugin needs 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 upgrade your PHP.
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You can install the currency conversion plugin from your WP admin area by searching for “currencyr” in the Plugins area and clicking the “Install” button …
After installing and activating the plugin, you can configure the plugin’s settings by selecting Currencyr from your admin navigation menu …
The plugin settings screen provides several configuration settings …
For example, you can choose your base currency from a dropdown menu. The default currency is ’USD’ …
You can specify any supported data provider from the dropdown menu in the ‘Provider’ section. The default selection is ‘Yahoo! Finance’, but you can choose another provider, such as European Central Bank, FoxRate, Google Finance or Open Exchange Rates …
Note: If you choose ‘Open Exchange Rates’ as your provider, you will need an API (Application Programming Interface) ID …
You can specify how often you would like to update the currency exchange rates by selecting an option from the Update Rates dropdown menu …
The plugin uses jQuery, which lets web developers add things like animation effects to web applications (like WordPress plugins).
Unless there is a reason to edit the jQuery settings, leave these as they are …
Edit the rest of the settings to suit your own needs and click ‘Save Changes’ when finished …
Once you have configured your plugin settings, you can easily start adding currency conversion to any WP post or page using widgets.
Refer to the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section at the bottom of this tutorial to learn more about using currency codes (e.g. USD, NZD, CAD, etc …) in the Currencyr plugin.
Currencyr Shortcodes
You can easily add currency conversion to WordPress pages, posts and widgets with no technical skills using shortcodes.
Here are some examples of currency shortcodes that you can add to posts and pages:
Let’s say that you are selling an item for a fixed amount (e.g. $175) in US Dollars (USD), and you would also like to display your conversion amount in British pounds (GBP) on your sales page.
All you need to do is insert the shortcode below into your post or page …
Note: You can also insert pricing in dollars and cents (for example, 19.95, 22.00, 400.00, etc …)
The example below shows how the shortcode looks once you have inserted it into your page or post …
Once your post has been published, the converted currency will then display as shown in the screenshot below …
Using the same example, let’s also convert the same amount into different currencies.
To do this, use the shortcode below (add as many currency symbols as you like by using vertical pipes) …
The screenshot below now shows how the shortcode looks when added to a post …
After publishing your page, the currency conversion will then appear like this …
See the ‘Additional Plugin Notes’ section below to learn how to change 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 the default.
For example, say you have set your default base currency as EUR and you have a section on your site targeted to non-European customers (e.g. Australia or Canada), you can change the base currency using the following shortcode …
Here’s how the shortcode appears when inserted into a post …
Once the post has been published, the converted currency amounts will then display as shown below …
How To Use The Plugin Widget
You can also insert a currency converter into your website’s sidebar section using the Currencyr widget.
To add currency conversion to your sidebar area, choose Appearance > Widgets from your WordPress user admin menu …
In the Widgets > Available Widgets area find the ‘Currencyr’ widget and drag it to an ‘Active Widgets’ area …
Configure the widget settings as shown in the screenshot below (add currency codes separated by a comma), and click ‘Save’ to update your settings …
Your currency conversion tool will now display on the sidebar menu with the options you have specified …
Additional Plugin Notes
Here are some additional notes and useful information about using the Currencyr plugin.
Currency Separator
The Currencyr plugin lets you specify the symbol 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 a forward slash as you can see in the example below …
If you modify the symbol and update your settings …
Your web site visitors will see the new symbol being used as the currency separator …
Integration With WordPress e-Commerce Platforms
As mentioned earlier, the Currencyr plugin can be integrated with various WP-compatible e-commerce plugins like WooCommerce, WP-eCommerce, Shopp, and Easy Digital Downloads …
(image sourced from Currencyr plugin website)
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:
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