Using cloud-based services for data avoids traditional business IT concerns of ensuring that locally stored data is protected and backed up -- but what if something happens to that cloud-based service, or your ability to connect to it?

"About one-third of data loss is due to user error, whether for local data on user drives or online," says Rob May, founder and CEO of Backupify. "For example, deleting an email message from Gmail, or somebody modifying or deleting a shared Google Doc, or an account being hacked and deleted.

For the many users of Google's business-oriented Google Apps, cloud data backup company Backupify recently announced its new Backupify for Google Apps, backup service for Google Apps data, offering daily backups for data created and used by Google's Gmail, Docs, Calendar, Contacts and Sites applications.

For small-to-midsize businesses looking at Google Apps but understandably concerned about potential data loss, Backupify for Google Apps provides assurance comparable to off-site backups of data on premises and on users' computers. The service is designed to be usable by SMBs which typically may have only a single IT administrator.

"Currently about 70 percent of companies that signed up for our beta tests had 15 or fewer employees, and six per cent had 250 or more employees," reports May.

Backupify uses Amazon's secure cloud storage. Users can access backups through a web browser, and backups can be downloaded to a PC. "To restore, you currently have to bring a file down to your computer and push it back up, but we are working on ways to let Backupify restore directly to Google Docs," says May.

Founded in 2008, Backupify's original -- and still available -- Social Media Backup service provides online backup, archiving and export services for cloud-based social media and SaaS data. "We back up data like hosted email from Gmail and Hotmail, social media services like FaceBook, Twitter, Flickr and Picasa, and services like BaseCamp," says May. "We don't back up PCs or servers, only data in the cloud -- social media and SaaS data. Currently we support 19 services on the consumer side."

Backupify currently performs backups on an automatic daily basis. "What we can do varies by service," says May. "For example, with Twitter, we can tap into the API and get updates continually. For most of our services, we currently do the backups daily. The next release of the Google Apps service will let you do it hourly."

Currently, Backupify for Google Apps offers backup for Gmail (eml), Google Docs (xls, doc, ppt), Google Calendar (ics, xml), Google Contacts (csv, vcard), and Google Sites (xml). This includes both files that created by the users, and that have been shared. "We back up all the files that you store," says May. "Because of the API, we can only support the file types that you can work on via Google Docs, but as Google supports more file types, so will we."

Also, according to May, Backupify is working on a business version of its Social Media backup service.

Backupify for Google Apps is currently available directly from the company via the company website and through Google Apps Marketplace, and through a channel partner program. Backupify for Google Apps currently is available in three plans, Basic ($9.95/month), Plus ($29.95/month) and Premium (59.95/month). A free thirty-day trial for Backupify for Google Apps is available; Backupify's consumer social media service includes a free version.