Playlist management controls the loop: which assets play on a given screen, in what order, and for how long each holds. It is the layer between individual content and the schedule that decides when the loop is active.
The decisions that matter are unglamorous. Loop length against expected dwell: a queue where people wait four minutes should not run a ninety-second loop. Frequency weighting so a priority message appears more often without dominating. And whether a playlist is a fixed order or shuffled, which changes how a repeat visitor experiences it.
The caveat is that playlists grow and nobody prunes them. Assets get added for campaigns and never removed, so the loop lengthens until a passer-by sees perhaps a fifth of it and no message reliably reaches anyone. A loop with fourteen items is usually a loop with no priorities.
Set a maximum length and enforce it: adding something means removing something. And give every asset an expiry at upload, so the loop prunes itself rather than relying on somebody remembering what a promotion was for.