When you start playing and your first town is founded in a semi-random spot, you get the option to skip the Tutorial. Don't do that. You may already know everything that it teaches, but it gives a lot of free stuff and only takes a few minutes to complete.
Follow the instructions in the order that they come. However, you don't need to do so to the letter, and deviating at the following points is worth the effort.
Sawmill
Assign 27 Workers. You will want 12 Scientists and 1 free citizen to build a Spearman.
Spearman
Build only 1 Spearman instead of 3. You will need more later, but not right now. You still get 3 Spearmen for free as a reward.
Trading Port
Don't use Ambrosia to accelerate. You still get the award and you can either save up, or use the Ambrosia for something more valuable. Use this one-minute wait (until finishing time is reduced to 5 minutes and you can accelerate without spending Ambrosia) to give yourself and your town decent names, so people around you will know you're a real player.
Merchant ship
Buy one more Merchant ship. Now you have three and won't need to come here again for ages.
Warehouse
You are asked to upgrade the Warehouse to level 3, to teach you how upgrading works. Instead, upgrade the Academy to level 3. This will be accepted just the same. You probably won't need a level 3 Warehouse for days, but you do want more scientists.
Barbarian Village
Send all your 4 Spearmen. While two are enough to defeat the single Barbarian without a loss, four will do that in only one round of fighting. Remember to send your Merchant ships with them, or you won't be able to transport the loot.
When you finish the Tutorial, you should be about 7 minutes in and ready for the next Guide.
Don't forget to finish the Well Construction research which is coming up soon. This is high priority. Assign extra scientists the moment the Academy has finished upgrading. You need to do that in the Academy itself, as you can't assign more than the old maximum in the Town Hall right after an upgrade (Academy, Sawmill or anything else).
Have fun! 
