That is the only question these studies exist to answer. Everything in them is chosen because it moves you closer to a decision you can defend to a board, and away from a report that sits in a drawer.
Every study begins the same way and ends with a recommendation you can act on.
A workshop with you, and a signed one-page Client Engagement Brief that fixes the decision, the questions and the thresholds. Usually week one.
Desk research against the agreed questions and, for the deeper two studies, an interview programme with buyers, distributors and industry bodies.
Analysis, the written report, and a recommendation tested against the thresholds you set in the brief, presented to you rather than just emailed.
Financial model, a shortlist of partners or acquisition targets, warm introductions, and the plan for the first 90 days and first year.
The difference between them is how much evidence sits behind the answer: desk research alone, research plus the interview programme, or the full picture with a plan and partners attached.
An early look at a market before you commit budget to it.
A go / no-go decision on entering a market, with evidence behind it.
You have decided to enter, and you need a plan and the people to do it with.
Nothing starts until the one-page Client Engagement Brief is agreed and signed. It names the decision the work must answer, the 3 to 5 questions that decision depends on, the thresholds that would make it a "go", and the constraints that rule options out. Each of those questions becomes a section of the report. Changes to the brief are agreed in writing before work continues, so there is no argument later about what was in scope.
Fees are fixed or flat monthly, agreed at signing, and invoiced in advance of the work they cover. You choose at signing whether to pay by stage or by month. The total is the same either way. There is no open-ended bill and no hourly meter running in the background.
Every report can be delivered in Chinese, or in English with a bilingual executive summary, for businesses whose decision-makers read Chinese. This is not a translation bolted on at the end. It is planned from the brief.
If you go on to a Business Development Leadership engagement within 3 months of delivery, a substantial share of the study fee is credited against your first invoice. A study that says "no, not this market" is just as valid an outcome, and considerably cheaper than finding out the slow way.