Four essential tips for newbies

1. Get hhmira's jewel file.

2. Get the resource planting overlays (right-click/save-as) :

Oil file (planting on the edges seems to give most barrels of oil)

Cotton file

Diamond file (you will need to contact ska for this file)

3. Invest in bonds

You can invest up to a maximum of 2500 geos in bonds, there are three types of bonds:

7 day (40%)
14 day (150%)
and 30 day (400%)

E.g. for a 14 day bond invest 178.5 (2500/14) geos each day.
Most people opt for the 14 day bond as the best compromise between risk and reward.

4. Get Martok's Redux 2 script from the script library. Read fluteflute's description of it.

++Update++

There's some useful information in this post, Tips for newbies, by Luke.

Okay Luke has confirmed that where you plant resources has no effect on the output you get, the same command runs each time. Ah well, at least your plantings can look orderly!