I've noticed that there are multiple ways of providing or asking for a
recommendation in Japanese.

The sentence structures I'm talking about are as follows:

> したらいい  
>  すればいい  
>  したほうがいい

In almost all situations I see these they get translated as "should do" and
they all seem to share a common structure of equating the done action as being
"good" but is there a difference in nuance or are they interchangeable?
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question
grammar word-choice nuances conditionals
Difference between ”conditional” いい and 方がいい for providing recommendations
That's complicated... Although they can sometimes mean the same thing, they
all have their own specific way to be used that could in some cases not be
interchangeable.

すれば is for more imaginary/hypothetical/have yet to happen situations.  
こうすればいけるかもしれない。

したら is for more for facts/occurred/related to a specific individual
situations.  
掃除したらきれいになるよ。

した方がいい is the one that can be used to compare 2 possibilities.  
青いやつより、赤いやつにした方がいい。

This could also be a good read for you: <http://tinyurl.com/jzt5leh>
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2016-10-18T01:04:50.433
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answer
First, I will discuss the difference between 「～～し **たら** いい」 and 「～～す **れば**
いい」.

The difference between the two expressions stems directly from the difference
between 「たら」 and 「れば」. Both practically mean the same thing, but as for
nuance, 「たら」 is more informal and conversational than 「れば」. The difference
might not be a significant one in many situations, but it surely exists.

Thus, 「したらいい」 and 「すればいい」 are interchangeable only for the meaning. Careful
speakers might also (try to) make alterations with the other words and phrases
within the sentence to reflect the change in formality between 「たら」 and 「れば」.
Whether or not those alterations are necessary would totally depend on the
actual sentences.

Moving on to the difference between the two expressions I just discussed above
and 「～～したほうがいい」. There is a difference in meaning/usage here even though it
might not always be reflected in the English translations - "You should ~~",
"You'd better ~~", etc.

「したほうがいい」 is used to give or ask for a recommendation _**when you are
basically choosing between TWO (2) possible actions**_. This would mean
choosing between "Action A and Action B" or between "Action A and not taking
Action A".

「したらいい」 and 「すればいい」 can be used _**when the number of possible actions to take
is between two and infinity**_.

Thus, the interchangeability is limited between 「したほうがいい」 and the other two.
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2016-12-17T04:35:19.243
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answer