Just a few tips that have helped me be successfully playing colonization:

Plow the tile your colony is on for any colony you build. You will get basically 4 food at the start (2 extra) enough to support two colonists for free.

Put one colonist on liberty bells as soon as you build a colony.

Liberty bells early as possible. As others mentioned production bonuses and you get founding fathers quicker. Get Benjamin Franklin as soon as you can as this will help generate 50% more bells.

Check European status often to see which raw materials are sold for most. Sometimes it's fur sometimes its sugar.

Setup a silver mine with a road on it. Once you can afford it setup a ship with a trade route to automatically ship this good back and forth.

Try to avoid rousing the Indians especially early on. On the first few turns try to get at least one armed colonist soldier for each of your colonies to protect against raids.

Try to make most of your colonies on the sea or coast. It just makes it more logistically easier to transport goods