Some tips I have discovered since I started to play, which is about 2 months now
1. Space stations always face a planet so that is where the door is. So when you approach try to come on on the same plane as the stations orbital ring and steer in so you are between the station and the planet.
2. If you have trouble locating the door, target the station and you will see arrows on the holo of the station pointing at the side the opening is on.
3. Fuel Scooping is a new skill set for me so and tips in this regard would be helpful
When I 1st arrive in a system I wait for count of 1/1000, 2/1000 then start a slow climb over the sun. If you look the sun has a ring around it in the form of an orange line. I've come to know that inside this line you will hit the sun or planet and outside this line you are good. So climb above the sun with that line just below your field of view and make a slow run across the top. Unssually as you start your climb your fuel scoop will deploy and will hit 125% + before you reach the apex. Keep your ship level and just fly away at normal cruise speed. If you are running on an "economical" flight path your tanks will top off at every sun. I ran from HIP 16607 to TUN and back which is over 44 jumps and used 32 credits of fuel.
4. Fixed weapons while making targeting a nightmare for new players actually do more damage than any gimbaled weapon. I find that on a small mount the preferred choice is a beam, medium mount a burst and large mount a pulse. This has been my experience thus far, I am not saying this is optimal, only that it seems to work for me.
5. When you get inside the station on docking, look at your targeting reticle. The position of the white dot tells you where the docking bay is. I almost always get docking bay 1 which is right inside the entrance and straight down, usually. Sometimes I have to pivot as its above me...a real pain in the butt.
6. Scooping cargo is hard for me most of the time so my solution is this. Install a collector limpet controller and carry some drones. When you see cargo floating about or its a mission thing, motor over to where the canisters are, open your cargo scoop and send out 1 drone. The drone will mindlessly collect everything it can until it expires and you can sit and eat your lunch
7. Selling illegal goods. If you are like me and get spooked trying to get past scanners at a station, then go to any system that is operated by a pirate faction. My system of choice is the Harm system and the Gentile station. Yes it has a black market and there are no cops anywhere and even if you do get scanned they don't care what you are carrying. A friend of mine and I were sitting outside that station just outside the no fire zone and we scanned NPC freighters coming and going. We found a type 9 loaded with 200 tons of gold. We attacked the transport and got his shields down then hit him with a hatch breaker and all they gold came tumbling out! We scooped and sold it right there and kept coming out collecting and docking to sell at the black market. We made about 460,000 cr each and it was fun