Research is a necessary part of preparing to trade. You will need to do extensive research on several issues: what kind of asset is digital money and its main features, potential cryptocurrencies for trading and scam projects to avoid, reputable and secure trading platform, fundamental and technical analysis, etc. As you see, the list is rather large so you have to invest your time first to have more chances on successful trading.
The main challenge is to select the best coins and the most suitable platform for trading. With the first task, the list of the largest cryptocurrencies by the market capitalization can help. Because they are considered the safest and the most reliable coins for both investment and trading. When choosing the best crypto exchange, pay attention to the security level, trading fees, customer support, the number of the crypto pairs, and the availability of the wallet or mobile app. For me, these factors are crucial therefore, I use CEX: https://cex.io/xrp-eur. Also, it benefits me because enables trading both crypto to crypto and fiat to crypto.