learn how specific weapons look so you can predict what the enemies will do.
pause some more, look at your systems, check on your weapon functionality, plan your upgrades.
don't sell and buy a ton of equipment, waste of scrap.
spend as much time in each sector as you can.
make sure your weapons work together, have some shield breakers and some damage dealers, or support for your other offense, such as boarding, drones.
upgrade shields first (bar some ships that don't have them).
Probably want to read up on some guides, or wait for people to come in here and start with all the advice, I can just point out the important stuff, not in the mood for a long post. If easy isn't enough scrap for you, scrap isn't the problem. There are many strong ship mods, if you just look through 's forums/working mods/master mod list.